I know raising awareness of obesity is important to you. And, that is why we need your help and your voice on June 17^th for an historic and first of its kind event – the Walk from Obesity – Walk on the Capitol.  

On June 17^th at 6:30 pm, the Obesity Action Coalition and the American Society for Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery Foundation will host this National event to send a strong message to the public and government that obesity needs to be prevented and treated. The Walk on the Capitol will be held on the National Mall in Washington, DC, where thousands of individuals will gather. We encourage and invite you, your family members and friends, healthcare professionals, industry leaders and any individual concerned about obesity to take part in this historical event. For more information, visit www.walkonthecapitol.com.

I am very excited about this. I hope you can join me and thousands of others. I have received so many emails from people saying, “How can I help?” Well this is it.  I hope to see YOU in Washington, DC! I’ll be there!

I recently received this email in which the reader asks a question that I have been asked many times before. I thought I would address her questiont here for everyone’s benefit.

Hello Barbara! 
I have just started to receive your newsletter and find it very beneficial. It is almost like a support group.  I am preparing to have RNY weight loss surgery.  I am 35 years old, my BMI is 42, my weight is 234 pounds and I am 5'2".  I have been told I will have diabetes if I do not do something.  I already have PCOS, gallstones, and periodic acid reflux.  As I begin to tell people that I am considering weight loss surgery, they say they are scared for me because there is not enough research to support the long-term results at 15, 20, or 40 years or more after surgery.  Could you point me in the direction of such research if you know where it might exist?  Thank You!  

Renee from Michigan

Hi Renee,
Welcome to the group!!! You have a very common concern and I am happy to have the opportunity to address it. There are no long term studies that are 40 years old because the surgery in its present state was not done 40 years ago. The New England Journal of Medicine in their August 2007 issue https://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/short/357/8/753 published a long term study that compared weight loss surgery patients who had surgery from 1984 to 2002, with people who are morbidly obese. Nearly 8,000 of them were matched according to BMI, age and sex.  What they found is that those who had surgery had a 40% lower death rate than those who didn’t have surgery.

So I guess what you might say to those people who are saying that there are no long term studies is that you don’t want to wait 20 more years for a longer term study and die in the meantime.  Say that you want a chance at a better quality of life.

I also wonder if the people who are saying that there are no long term studies are themselves candidates for surgery. They may be discouraging you because they will feel bad about themselves when you are thin and they are still large because they haven’t had the courage to have surgery.  I am one to believe in the basic goodness of people, but I have seen this many times.  I don’t think people realize what they are doing. They don’t intend to be intentionally mean. They do it not knowing what they are doing.

This is a decision that only you can make.  It has to feel right for you. But you need to read, do research and talk to people at your support group who have had surgery. Yes, there are definitely things that can go wrong, but your chance of a good quality of life is much higher having had surgery.

Good luck to you!

Barbara,
I called a bariatric doctor on a radio talk show and she said that successful weight loss is measured at the 10 year mark.  Any and all bariatric weight loss surgery has failed before the 10 year mark. I am now about 6-7 years out. She said to call her back at 10 years and she could bet I wouldn't stay the weight I was.  What are your thoughts about this?

Ellen

Dear Ellen,
I can’t print my real thoughts on this because too many expletives would have to be deleted!!  That was a very irresponsible thing for this doctor to say.

My surgery was 8 ½ years ago, but having surgery was actually recommended to me in 1998 – 10 years ago. My surgical option 10 years ago was the Vertical Banded Gastroplasty (VBG) which was the common surgery at the time. The RNY was being done, but it was much rarer than the VBG. I delayed my surgery until January 2000 and by then I had the RNY as another option.

The VBG is almost never done anymore because so many of them failed. There was no bypass of the intestines and the banding between the upper and lower stomach was just sutured and the sutures would open up so your stomach would revert to its original size and you would regain all the weight you had lost. 

So yes, she is correct that if you had surgery 10 years ago chances are you regained your weight because your VBG failed. Is she not aware that the 10 year failures are due to a surgery that you didn’t even have? And how about me? I have maintained my weight for 8 ½ years.  So in 1 ½ years she expects that I will suddenly balloon to my original size?

The success rate of patients is increasing all the time.  Pouches are being made much smaller than they were when I had my surgery and the Centers of Excellence are offering so much more support in terms of counseling services and support groups.

As a doctor, she is challenging you to fail. I call that a self-fulfilling prophesy. A doctor tells you that you will regain weight, and we tend to respect doctors and it ends up happening. Well don’t listen to her.  She sounds like the Howard Stern of University radio. Pure shock jock!

“Reprinted from Barbara Thompson’s free e-newsletter featuring helpful information and research material to help patients succeed following weight loss surgery.
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