Bariatric Surgery

I attended a seminar this week, and one of the speakers talked about trends in healthcare. It was fascinating. One of the biggest areas of growth for hospitals right now, and in some markets, THE biggest, is bariatric (weight loss) surgery, followed by plastic surgery, as a result of weight loss surgery. The speaker commented that he thinks it says a lot about our society right now that we have such a need for bariatrics.

Duh.

Oh, is there an obesity epidemic in the US? I hadn't noticed.

I didn't like the way he said it. He said it in a judgemental way. Weight loss surgery is a medical treatment for a disease. Yes, obesity is classified as a disease. It's a disease that is judged by society, similar to alcoholism, another disease. Some people are predisposed to alcoholism, other's obesity or diabetes or heart conditions or cancer. We can all do things to try to prevent our predispositions, but it's not always possible, and we are imperfect.

Diet and exercise has a success record of only 2-5%* for the obese, over time. (Incidentally, in the interest of objectivity, I didn't cite any weight loss surgery proponents for these statistics, though, as you can imagine, all WLS litature is littered with these stats.) If you are in that 2-5%, you are awesome, and that is fantastic! Statistically speaking, however, weight loss surgery is the only effective method of treatment for obesity. I'm not talking about being overweight, and having 30-40 lbs to lose, but once you're in the 60 to 80 to 100 + zone, it's something worth considering. Weight loss surgery has an 80% success rate.** (Although I've heard as low as 50-60% success rate, and that's still remarkably better than 2-5%.)

It is a surgical solution to a medical problem. Our society has a very unhealthy relationship with food, and for those of us who are lucky enough to be predisposed to obesity, we can finally get the help we need to take our lives back. No one should judge this or look down upon our culture for finally providing the help that people desperately need. Yes, we own a big part of the problem when we get to be soo overweight - I owned most of the problem, and I know that, but now I own the solution. No one can discount that.

So there. ;-)

*http://www.delicious-low-fat-recipes.com/article-quit-your-diet.html

http://www.nourishingconnections.com/five_facts_diet_industry.htm

http://www.naafa.org/documents/brochures/nextdiet.html

**http://www.stronghealth.com/services/surgical/bariatric/