Lap Banded

This is community of happy, Lap Band® patients with a new outlook on life. Enjoy :)

"Bariatric surgery" refers to surgical procedures designed to induce weight loss. While there are numerous different types of bariatric surgery, most procedures performed currently are either gastric bypass or laparoscopic banding. Both of these procedures result in significant, sustained weight loss as well as improvement of many obesity-associated conditions such as type II diabetes, high cholesterol, high blood pressure, obstructive sleep apnea, and gastroesophageal reflux disease.

This surgery is commonly referred to as “the Lap Band® procedure” because the most commonly used product for this procedure is Alergan's Lap Band®. For more information about the Lap Band® visit Alergan's site at www.lapband.com. In this procedure, a band is placed around the stomach and tightened to create a small pouch just below the esophagus. As a result, only a small amount of food can pass through the stomach at each meal and thus the amount of food consumed each day decreases. It is important to remember, however, that in order for laparoscopic banding to work, the individual still must diet and exercise in order to loose weight.

This procedure is somewhat more complicated than laparoscopic banding. In gastric bypass, the surgeon creates a small pouch at the top of the stomach and seals it off from the lower stomach with staples. The surgeon then, severs the small intestine which is downstream from the stomach and connects it to the pouch. So, after this procedure, the food never goes into the lower stomach or the part of the intestinal track just below it called the duodenum. Unlike with laparoscopic banding, gastric bypass is not reversible.