Lap Band Less-Invasive Option For Weight Loss Surgery

When Cecelia Jobe of Moss Point was at her heaviest, she could barely walk up one flight of stairs, she couldn’t trim her toenails and her face would turn beet red if she walked more than 10 minutes.

“It was embarrassing,” she said.

Jobe, 53, tried every possible diet on the market, but the weight would not come off.

“I had always been a little heavy, but it got really bad over the last 13 years,” she said. “I might lose a few pounds, but I would always gain it back.”

Jobe decided to do something drastic when she lost her job and had problems getting a new one because of her weight.

“I had to have surgery,” she said.

Following the advice of a friend, Jobe looked into the University of Mississippi Medical Center and made an appointment with Dr. J.R. Salameh, assistant professor of surgery.

After researching weight loss or bariatric surgery, Jobe said she wanted to try a less invasive surgery rather than the common gastric bypass.

Salameh said he thought Jobe would be the perfect candidate for the laparoscopic adjustable gastric banding (lap band). In November, she was UMC’s first patient to have the procedure.

More than three months later and 65 pounds lighter, Jobe, who weighed 250 pounds at her heaviest, would have to agree.

In November, Jobe was UMC’s first patient to have the lap band procedure.

“We have a well established weight loss surgery program at the Medical Center,” Salameh said. “The procedure we have been offering is the gastric bypass and we recently added this procedure (lap band) as another option for patients.

“These operations are procedures of last resort.”

The lap band surgery is a purely restrictive surgical procedure in which a band is placed around the upper most part of the stomach, according to Salameh.

“This band divides the stomach into two portions, a small portion and a larger portion,” he said. “The band has an inner balloon that is connected to a port placed under the skin; by injecting fluid into the balloon, the band is made tighter and patients feel full faster.”

The gastric bypass surgery is a more common operation which involves dividing the stomach to create a very small pouch to reduce the actual stomach size used for food and reattaching a loop of intestine to that pouch in order to reestablish the flow of contents throughout the GI tract, according to Dr. Kenneth D. Vick, assistant professor of surgery. Vick also assisted with the surgery.

“The laparoscopic band is similar to the gastric bypass in that it creates a restrictive pouch without actually dividing the stomach,” Vick said.                      

“There are other differences between the two that are significant, pertaining to the reconnection of the small intestine to a small gastric pouch, as seen in the gastric bypass, which is not done in the lap-band procedure.”

Salameh started the process with Jobe several months before her operation. Preparation usually takes about three months, but due to special circumstances, Jobe’s case took a little longer.

“I was originally scheduled to go into surgery Aug. 29,” Jobe said. “We had reserved a room at a hotel and my husband and I were waiting for surgery. Dr. Salameh postponed it that morning because of Hurricane Katrina. He knew I lived on the Coast and he knew that it would be too much to deal with – recovery from a surgery and recovery from the hurricane.

“We were very lucky because we already had a hotel room here, so we stayed here until we were able to go back to Moss Point. It worked out well.”

Jobe had the surgery Nov. 3. She was back at work on Nov. 7.

“I’m a convenience store manager and I couldn’t lift anything above 10 pounds for six weeks. The surgery was quick and I healed fast.”

The best candidates for the lap band are those who have a body mass index greater than 40 or those who are 100 pounds overweight, according to Vick. Some patients with a body mass index between 35 and 40 can be considered if they have a severe medical condition due to their obesity, such as diabetes.

Weight loss with the lap band is a little slower than gastric bypass surgery, occurring gradually within a two-year period, Salameh said.

“This is something a lot of Mississippians are interested in,” he said. “Nearly 65 percent of adults in the state are overweight or obese and 28 percent are obese. Those are the highest rates in the United States.”

Obesity surgery is not for everyone, according to Salameh, who said it is, however, a viable option for many morbidly obese patients.

According to Jobe, surgery was the right choice for her.

“It is the best thing I did in the world,” she said. “The procedure was great and I never got sick. It was wonderful.”

—    Jenny Woodruff (2-27-06)

2006-02-27 00:00:00 2825