Ivan Strachan, MD

The country where you get the procedure done should not be your number one priority. The factors to be taken into consideration are safety first. The gastric bypass is minimally invasive, but still it does have some risks, so you should research the percentage of complications that the doctor has. Another point to take into consideration is the success of the patients. Do these patients re-gain weight after time goes by? As for the hospital where the procedure will be done you should research for higiene, since there are risks for infection and bacteria. Another factor is lodging. Where will you be staying in the days following the surgery. Does your Doctor offer you a recovery house? Recovery after gastric by-pass is more or less painless and you will be feeling great after 3 days. I clear my patients to travel after 10 days post-op and have plans where I include transportation to/from the airport, to/from doctors visits, and lodging. You should be able to make your decision based on these points.

There are revision procedures that can be done but in order to answer this question throughly I will need to know your capacity of food intake, how many slices of pizza can you eat now?

If you are getting local anesthesia for your achilles then it shouldn´t be a problem to have your procedure done, but if you will be put under general anestesia then my recomendation would be to wait longer to get the procedure done.

Our technique starts with a thorough and systematic dissection of the esophageal hiatus and gastric fundus. The sleeve is created by resecting the greater curvature of the stomach. This is followed by reinforcement of the staple line with a running suture. The weight loss obtained comes from the strict dissection of the stomach reducing its capacity for intake. The results for weight loss with the VSG are about 100-150 lbs., if you need to lose 200lbs. I would suggest getting a gastric by-pass procedure to reach a healthy weight. Our technique has been presented this year in IFSO and SAGES.

Patients that have had this procedure done have told me that the first 12 hours after surgery they feel pain either on their back, shoulders or in their chest, as time progresses they no longer feel pain and just discomfort or soreness. Since the sleeve gastrectomy is performed laporscopically it is minimally invasive which typically has you discharged from the hospital the next day. I have patients back in my office 5 days post-op. Recovery is quick and patients are back to their daily routines by 2 weeks.