WLS For Everyone!
Ooh boy. One researcher from Britain says that, since diets don’t work, the best answer is to start performing weight loss surgery as a “preventative” measure, even on those whose BMI is less than 35.
“Surgery is currently the only effective treatment for obesity … It not only helps people lose weight by physically decreasing the amount they can eat, but also alters their hormone profile, meaning they feel less hungry and therefore find it much easier to maintain weight loss.”…
“The only proven way to lose weight and live longer is by having obesity surgery,” he said. “This type of surgery will, however, not make you thin, nor will it make you happy, it will only make you healthier.”
The theory continues that since WLS is “more effective” than “lifestyle changes” or “drugs” over the long-term it should be offered as the new first course of action to “treat” obesity.
Wow, I can’t seem to stop “using” these “ironic quotes” around everything. I “literally” cannot wait to hear what you guys are going to make of this.
Posted by mo pie
Filed under: Advocacy, Cold Hard Cash, Health, International, WLS
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The British researcher…Dr. Frankenstein, I presume?
Frankenstein wasn’t british he was german.
Sorry I was in the middle of looking for halloween stuff so it was in the back of my head.
Healthier, maybe. But HAPPIER? I doubt it. How happy could I possibly be, not being able to eat my wife’s fried chicken (by which I mean several pieces) anymore?
*chuckles*
*rolls eyes*
Yet more biased stupidity, its rampant these days.
Ok so the insurance companies would cover this… but still not the broken arm on the uninsured kid living down the block?
wow. You say this researcher wants to use this as a preventitive measure, and blog title is WLS for Everyone, implying that this guy wants WLS for … well… everyone.
That isn’t what the article says. It says for overweight people,and the implication (from the rest of what he says) is overweight people with high probability or indication of future morbid obesity.
First off, I don’t think anyone is REQUIRING, WLS for anyone, but opening it up for those who have predisposition to unhealthy weight would be a benefit.
But this shouldn’t feed into the prejudice against plus sized individuals. Obviously there’s more than enough of that going around!
WLS should be a choice, and it should be an option AVAILABLE as a preventative health option for those who want it due to other risk factors.
“The only proven way to lose weight and live longer is by having obesity surgery,” he said. “This type of surgery will, however, not make you thin, nor will it make you happy, it will only make you healthier.”
So if this surgery doesn’t make you thin or happy, then what’s the point?
Sure, it might make you healthier, so long as it doesn’t make you dead, or make you one of the over half of post-op WLS patients with serious complications within the first year, or make you blow your brains out (since post-op WLS patients have a much higher rate of suicide). Yeah, healthy!
In just my own small circle, I know five people personally who have had WLS. Two were dead within a year (one within just two weeks of his surgery); two of the three who lived have gained back most of the weight they lost. I don’t like those odds much.
“Surgery is currently the only effective treatment for obesity”
Wait…whaaaat?
I think I just lost a few pounds from the fit of laughter!
I wonder how this doctor justifies his comments in light of the increasing numbers of people who are seeking REVERSALS of their WLS because it brought them to the brink of DEATH.
Kate said: WLS should be a choice, and it should be an option AVAILABLE as a preventative health option for those who want it due to other risk factors.
Bill Clinton said that abortions should be “safe, legal and rare.” I think the same should be true for WLS. I support body autonomy and the right to make informed medical decisions about one’s health, but at the same time, I question just how “informed” WLS candidates are about WLS, or its risks. My best friend Lisa had WLS last year and she researched it for a full year on her own before making the decision to have the DDS procedure. She said that most patients opt for the more popular Roux-en-Y bypass, not because it is the safest procedure, but because it requires the least amount of training to do. Doctors can learn the procedure in a simple weekend, whereas those who perform safer DDS procedures often have to spend much more time and money learning it. Lisa also belongs to a large WLS and obesity support messageboard, and she said she often sees comments by people who say they didn’t even know other WLS options were available to them. And regardless of which procedure one undergoes, I think WLS should be used as an absolute last option only (and ethical doctors agree). Doctors see the bariatric field as the new cash cow and some unscrupulous doctors are even performing WLS on people who are just 30 – 40 pounds overweight.
I’m also concerned that even those patients who are informed about WLS may discard the information provided to them. I have a family friend A, who wants the lap band surgery. She was rightly told that she is not a candidate for the surgery because the psychological evaluation of her suggested that she is not able to follow the new diet plan required by surgery because of emotional attachments to food and that she lacks family support. Angie doesn’t care and she plans to go to another center, where she says she now “knows” how to answer the questions.
I’ve sustained a significant weight loss because I was able to normalize my relationship with food and because I’ve adopted a healthier lifestyle. No surgery needed. I think that, for most people, a healthy balanced diet and active lifestyle will help them reach and sustain a weight that is healthy for them. The problem is, this weight may or may not be “thin.”
“So if this surgery doesn’t make you thin or happy, then what’s the point?”
Yeah, I mean, if the Enforcers are going to amputate my stomach, then I want to come out looking like Posh Spice!
WLS is an extreme measure. It is NOT permanent in many people. It CAUSES vitamin and other nutrient deficiencies, even in people who are taking their supplements. It is not something that people should do just to lose 30-40 lbs.
Geez, I don’t think there’s nearly enough evidence that WLS does indeed make people healthier, thinner perhaps, but it certainly comes with significant risks.
*shudders*
I actually heard this guy speak for about an hour, and he didn’t exactly say “wls for everyone!”.
He is really extreme in his views, but a lot of what he said made a lot of sense.
Sure, its better to eat right and exercise, and you should do that wls or not, but the reality is for a large percent people with a great deal of weight to lose, we are not going to lose large amounts or weight, or keep it off if we do, with diet and exercise alone.
I agree on the surface he sounds completely wacky, but you should dig up some more info on what he he saying before getting completely on his case.
“The only proven way to lose weight and live longer is by having obesity surgery,” he said. “This type of surgery will, however, not make you thin, nor will it make you happy, it will only make you healthier.”
actually no you don’t live longer—according to the most recent research you increase your risk of dying earlier by around 300%
actually no it does not make you healthier—if you consider having these complications as being healthier–
Dehydration, Chronic Vomiting and Nausea, Stroke, Heart Attack, Arrythmia, Kidney stones, Kidney Failure, Liver Failure, Anemia, Deficiencies (B-12,potassium, iron, B-1, B-6, etc.), Malabsorbtion of supplements
(calcium, minerals, nutrients from food), Blurred Vision, Muscle and Bone Pain, Loss of Teeth, Bleeding Gums, Rotting Teeth Due to Vomiting Requiring Root Canals, Hypoglycemia, Headaches, Blackouts/Seizures, Lactose Intolorant, Injury to Spleen during surgery, Coma, Paralysis/Blindness after coma, Osteoporsis, Burst Pouch,
Lupus, Auto-Immune Disease, Looped Intestines, Ruptured Esophagus from vomiting, Misfired Staper during surgery, Ulcers, Pneumonia/Lung Problems, Arthritis, Weakness and Fatigue from Malnutrition, Overall Pain, Metabolic Bone Disease, Food Blocking Stoma Causing Severe Pain, Stoma Needing Stretched Repeatedly, Neuropathy, Beri Beri, Put on Feeding Tubes/PICC Lines, Fibromyalgia, Chronic Fatigue, Fistulas, Atrophy of Muscles, Hair Loss, Hernias, Blood Clots, Leaks, Peritonitis, Heartburn/Gerd/Acid Reflux, Bowel Obstructions, Gallstones and Gallbladder Removal, Severe Depression, Anxiety, Loss of Memory, Poor Concentration, Irrigular Blood Pressure, Diahhrea, Constipation, Opening Of Outer Incision-Needing Packing Until Healed From The Inside Out, Insomnia/Sleep Disorders, Unforced Anorexia and
Bulemia, Gas, Silent Stroke, Vertigo, Malnutrition which is the cause of many of the above problems, Many End Up Becoming Invalids, and then there is death.
As someone who actually fell for the WLS hype and had it done 4 years ago—yes I lost over 200 lbs—was a model post op story for my surgeon—a huge success in the eyes of my WLS friends—yet here are just a few of the complications I have endured—severe malnutrition (read starvation levels here) severe malabsortion requiring many of my vitamins, meds and nutrients have to be given by injection or IV, reactive hypoglycemia, fibromyalgia, osteoporosis, osteoarthritis, am in the process of having all my teeth pulled becaus they are crumbling out of my head, broken bones due to the osteoporosis, chronic fatigue, night blindness, no longer able to work and am on disability
but hey I’m thin….yeah right—I’d take my health and my 200+ pounds back in a heartbeat
My girlfriend did her masters thessis on lab-banding when she was in medical school — she and her research partner won state and national awards for their research (which had to do with procedure and presentation).
They surveyed a small sample — about 300 people – who had had lap-banding. What they found was that almost all the patients *felt* they were in better health than they were before surgery. Almost none of the patients had lost the amount of weight their physicians wanted, and a surprising number — not half, I don’t think, maybe closer to a third — still had to take prescription drugs for cholesterol, hypertension and were still coping with diabetes.
I thought that was surprising. I thought more people would become healthier.
I also don’t know that I’d consider someone healthier if they required a lot of supplements to be nourished, and if they experience nausea, vomiting and/or diarrhea more than 4 times a month.
“WLS is an extreme measure. It is NOT permanent in many people. It CAUSES vitamin and other nutrient deficiencies, even in people who are taking their supplements. It is not something that people should do just to lose 30-40 lbs.”
Exactly. And there are ethical doctors who would not do it on patients unless their weight actually caused them to not live a functional life and they were in serious risk of death or chronic disease. But like Rachel says, it’s a cash cow and there are doctors out there so turned off by fat they would do it in a heartbeat.
This quack has bought into the “fat people eat too much myth”. Yes, there are people who do overeat, but not all of them are fat, and we don’t propose surgery for thin binge eaters.
WLS is getting to be more of surgery to look socially acceptable, and that is wrong and dangerous.
I thought you might have been trying to be ironic with the no comments :).
This is frustrating because the definition of health becomes limited by certain parameters. There is, certainly, some cases in which WLS might be necessary, but the wholesale use of the surgery as a preventative measure does not seem like a terribly bright idea given the problems that people do experience.
Besides, all of us can be skinny if we would just exercise 3-4 hours a day!
I have a question — face it, most researchers are backed by some money, somewhere. Who the hell is funding this guy’s “research”?
Rhetorical question, of course. We can all guess the answer.
@ Bree — You hit it. It’s not for people like me. According to this “researcher” — I’m a candidate for WLS because of my BMI. My very responsible doctor (in a conversation where I brought up the fact that “WLS won’t solve my problem” ) even said, “You’re not a candidate, really. Your fat is making you unhappy, but it’s not killing you, and from a purely physical standpoint, the risks outweigh the benefits.”
we are not going to lose large amounts or weight, or keep it off if we do, with diet and exercise alone.
So what? Seriously, unless your goal is the elimination of fat people from the face of the earth, so what? There’s no evidence that WLS makes people healthy, and a great deal of evidence that it screws people up for life – or kills them outright. This is about socially acceptable bodies, nothing more.
There is a great deal of difference between a healthy fat person having WLS for cosmetic reasons and an unhealthy fat person having WLS to save their life. I was that unhealthy fat person, and I vastly improved the quality of my life by having WLS. I’d have my Duodenal Switch done once a year if I had to in order to be as healthyas I am and feel as good as I do now.
I think WLS as a purely prophylactic measure is preposterous. As a last resort, when and if you’re so unhealthy you risk dying from obesity-related diseases, then do it if you want. For some people, this is a life-saver. It’s not about looking like a supermodel.
“So if this surgery doesn’t make you thin or happy, then what’s the point?”
I know, right?
I saw Star Jones at the U.S. Open.
I think she’s gaining her weight back.
“Yeah, I mean, if the Enforcers are going to amputate my stomach, then I want to come out looking like Posh Spice!”
No **** Sherlock.
No. Changed my mind.
Angelina Jolie.
If I’m going through that excruciation I want the whole enchilada.
” … even on those whose BMI is less than 35. ”
You know what else? I’m curious.
How low do they plan to go with this??
30? 25?
18???
All I can say is WTF?!?!?!?!
How the hell did this guy ever get a degree?!?!?!
“The only proven way to lose weight…is by having obesity surgery”. Presumably, he means permanently. Of course, he couldn’t be more wrong. Looking forward to publishing a book on the subject.
I have felt WLS is a glaring example of what happens when doctors ignore “first do no harm”. There are seemingly a bazillion reason not to get WLS, and only one reason to get it that has zero to do with health.
Being thin.
I’m looking forward to your book Mary, let me know when it comes out. I find books that support what I hear among fat acceptance websites to be very interesting. Although a lot of times I feel like putting my hand to my forehead and saying, “How can these “professionals” be so stupid?!”
My husband’s doctor advised him to have WLS. We went to a local bariatric surgeon, and we waited for TWO HOURS to see him, and no other patients were there! He gave us the basics about what WLS was, but got really uncomfortable when I asked questions about patient mortality rate within two years of having WLS, and the actual health of the other survivors of the procedure.
I guess that’s why the good doctor told my husband that he had to lose 120 pounds before he’d even touch him. (He never answered my questions, BTW.)
The long wait and the fruitless “consultation” cost us 300 bucks that we’ll never see again.
(I like the snarky quotation marks, too!)
I have had wls surgery, and it was the best decision of my life. That said, I think the idea of recommending surgery as anything but a last resort, and as a preventative measure, is completely crazypants. Some people are able to maintain weight loss through diet and exercise alone; some need the help of surgery to be able to do that. However, why would you leap to surgery before making that determination? Also, what weight loss and happiness have to do with one another, I’ll never know. That’s apples and llamas.