Keyhole op to shrink tum into shape of banana
GASTRIC BAND ALTERNATIVE COULD SAVE NHS MILLIONS
A WEIGHT loss operation that reduces patients’ stomachs to the shape of a banana could save the
that you’ve had surgery.” A report in the Health and Care Excellence. Mr Kelly country a fortune.
British Medical Journal said 2.6 million performed the first ESG this year at a The procedure is more expensive than people could qualify for treatment. private hospital in the City. established gastric bypasses or bands – Surgeons performing ESG use buttons He said: “It is a very smart device that £10,000 instead of £6,000. and levers on handles to operate a device does all the stitching for you as you move But patients can be treated and
which goes down the throat into the it along. Patients are in theatre for about discharged the same day, saving the NHS an hour anda a half and are in good an estimated £6.7million a year. stomach. There is no incision.
shape when they wake up. shape“Each year in Britain there are about A camera on the gadget
“There are some complaints 6,000 gastric band and bypass surgeries. guides medics to the stomach
ofo tightness in the tummy and Patients spend up to five days in hospital and staples are applied,
forf a few hours they feel at an average cost of £260 a day. reducing the organ’s size by distended from wind trapped
Experts think the number should be 70 per cent. ESG leaves no in their stomach. But that 50,000 to combat the obesity and diabetes scars and patients have veryv quickly disappears, epidemic which puts a multi- million reported weight loss of up to certainlyce by the next day.” pound strain on the health service. 60 per cent in a year. With established obesity
Now the new technique, called First done in the US, the op is ops, patients are scarred where endoscopic sleeve gastroplasty, makes being trialled by Consultant General the instruments enter the abdomen. that target a realistic cost-cutter. Surgeon Jamie Kelly at the NHS’s Cutting and rejoining of the stomach
Dr David Ashton, who helped pioneer Southampton General Hospital. and digestive tract with a bypass carries the gastric band more than 20 years ago, It is hoped ESG will be routinely a risk of leaks and complications. said: “This is more groundbreaking. With available on the NHS but it is yet to be Businessman and ex-bodybuilder Carlo this operation you’ve nothing to show approved by the National Institute for Malluci, 50, of Birmingham, had ESG two months ago and has lost three stone from his 6ft 3in frame.
He was 25st and wants to get down to 17st. He said he was verging on becoming a diabetic but did not want surgery that “cut away bits of you”. Mr Malluci said: “I’m really impressed with the way I’ve lost weight and how your stomach controls how much you eat.”
Iman Saith, 24, a Cambridge University business graduate, has lost two stone since the op five weeks ago. She was 17st and wants to be 12st for her wedding.
Boyfriend
She said: “I won’t be skinny but I’ll have lost a lot of weight that couldn’t be lost by willpower alone.
“If my boyfriend doesn’t like the new me he’ll have to deal with. I’m hoping he’ll find 12 stone acceptable.”
Meanwhile doctors at Imperial College London are trialling a non-surgery gastric band called an EndoBarrier.
It is fed through the mouth and stomach into the small intestine, where it unfurls to create a 2ft tube that stops food being absorbed until it is further down the digestive tract. The techniques mimics the effects of a gastric bypass.