The sleeve gastrectomy is the popular procedure these days. Those promoting this surgery suggest it's safer than the gastric bypass because no bowel is bypassed. But the problem with the procedure is that in order to promote weight loss, surgeons must cut away 90-95% of the stomach, leaving a remnant about twice as long as your thumb and the same size.
True to the "conspiracy of silence" about weight loss surgery, the dark side of this procedure has been mostly not told.
But as the procedure gets more popular, the dark side is emerging.
Some patients are beginning to tell their stories and there is a very dark side to this surgery - one patient mentioned that it's very difficult to get in even the minimum of 6 glasses of water daily and describes the shock of seeing brown urine (extremely dehydrated and hard on the kidneys).
This makes sense because this procedure retains the lower stomach valve but the tiny thumb sized stomach doesn't really conduct the peristaltic wave very well so perhaps the valve which is dependent on the muscular movement of the stomach, doesn't really work very well (probably why they did not include it in the gastric bypass). A swallow or two fills the tiny stomach and takes a while to empty - think of the difficulty of swallowing water slowly, a swallow or two at a time and it becomes a real chore just to get even a glass or two of water in, during the day.
Additionally, the tiny stomach likely does not do much digesting of either proteins or fats (we do need some fats) or calcium or B12.
Finally, patients describe a constant and very serious case of GERD or gastric reflux and well as problems with leaks and "fistulas". The tiny size of the stomach would also tend to cause a detention of the esophagus, a problem seen in the gastric bypass also.
If the patients keep the weight off, it's by starvation and / or dehydration and/or illness - this is anything but healthy!
Patients should realize that doing something unhealthy is not worth getting the weight off - especially as there is no reversal possible of this procedure since the part of the stomach removed is discarded
The sleeve gastrectomy is a permanent change to the stomach in other words...
Bottom line, all that glitters is not only not gold but may not even be really glittering when you live with it... Caveat Emptor - or "let the buyer beware".
