Justin C. K. Davis, M.D. is one of San Francisco's finest house call specialist physicians, and has been providing house calls and office visits to the Bay Area since 2005. His practice is built upon a philosophy of excellent customer service and excellent patient care.
JUSTIN C.K. DAVIS, M.D.: Hi. My name is Doctor Justin Davis, and today I would like to tell you about gastric bypass. Gastric bypass is a kind of surgery that is used to help people lose weight. Now, it is not just used for anyone to lose weight; gastric bypass is a very serious procedure that is only done when people have tried all other methods of losing weight and simply are unsuccessful. Usually, this is reserved for people that are very overweight, usually with a body mass index of 40 or greater, that is pretty overweight, or have some kind of life-threatening problem associated with being overweight. The most common type of gastric bypass surgery is known as a Roux-en-Y procedure. This is when part of the upper part of the stomach is made into a pouch which shrinks the stomach and then the stomach is detached from where it normally connects to the intestines and connected further down in the middle of the lower intestine. Why would this be done? Well, for a number of reasons: First of all, when the stomach is smaller, somebody is able to eat much less. They also may feel a sense of "satiety", that means feeling full much quicker. The other reason is that since you are bypassing part of the small intestines, less food can be absorb that means less calories and that means less weight. Now this can be a very serious procedure and it is not always successful so it is something to be discussed very seriously with your doctor. Usually, this procedure is not successful by itself and must be combined with other therapy modalities such as exercise, change in diet, and psychological counseling. So what can you do to prevent this? Well, preventing this means preventing being severely obese. It is not as easy as it sounds, as anybody that is overweight knows, and believe me plenty of people know this. In America alone, 60 million people, that is a lot of people, are overweight. Now not all of these people, in fact most of these people would not need a gastric bypass surgery, but it is a possibility for some people who have serious problems associated with their weight and just cannot lose the weight by other means, so that means having a healthy lifestyle, plenty of exercise and a healthy diet. Remember, this will not only help you avoid having a gastric bypass surgery but will prevent many other serious health problems.
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