Showing posts with label Diabetes. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Diabetes. Show all posts

Monday, October 01, 2007

New Hope for Diabetics !!

Gastric Bypass Surgery which has been a boon for all the severely Obese people, has found to have long term benefits in Type 2 Diabetes Patients too.
Gastric bypass surgery, a type of bariatric surgery (weight loss surgery), is a surgical procedure that alters the process of digestion. Bariatric surgery is the only option today that effectively treats morbid obesity in people for whom more conservative measures such as diet, exercise, and medication have failed. Usually done is a procedure called Roux-en-Y Gastric bypass.
Though it is a major surgery and one has to weigh the risks of surgery and post-operative care before going for such a major surgery, it has good long term benefits in:

  • persons with a Body Mass Index (BMI) greater than 40
  • men who are 100 pounds over their ideal body weight or women who are 80 pounds over their ideal body weight
  • persons with a BMI between 35 and 40 who have another condition such as obesity-related type 2 diabetes, sleep apnoea, or heart diseaseP
Procedure:
In this surgery, the size of stomach and small intestine are reduced, which leads to decreased demand for food leading to loss of weight. In the metabolic surgery for Type 2 Diabetes mellitus, technique is same but difference is alteration of length of small intestine without any alteration in stomach.
Mechanism of Action:
When the Small intestine's length is reduced, A portion of small intestine which has never been exposed to raw food, comes in contact with it. This leads to certain beneficial hormonal changes, which stimulates pancreas to secrete Insulin ( hormone implicated in causation of diabetes). This holds good for diabetes type 2 where there is atleast some insulin producing cells in pancreas. Whereas in type 1 , there is complete absence of insulin producing cells, so only treatment in that case is externally given insulin.
Many Experts say this surgery not only reduces the problem of Obesity, but also gives a better control of Blood Sugar, Cholesterol, Triglycerides etc. indicating having a role in arresting or delaying the progression of Chronic Diseases like Diabetes, Hypertension, Heart Disease.
According to some researchers, this surgery has found to be useful not only in Obese diabetics, but also in moderate to normal weight patients. For some patients it has been completely curative, and for many there has been drastic improvement in survival and quality of Life.
Well on the Other hand, Risks of a major surgery always prevail.

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