Preliminary results from digestive adaptation: a new surgical proposal for treating obesity, based on physiology and evolution.
OBJECTIVE
Most bariatric surgical techniques include essentially non-physiological features like narrowing anastomoses or bands, or digestive segment exclusion, especially the duodenum. This potentially causes symptoms or complications. The aim here was to report on the preliminary results from a new surgical technique for treating morbid obesity that takes a physiological and evolutionary approach.


METHODS
Case series description, in Hospital Israelita Albert Einstein and Hospital da Polícia Militar, São Paulo, and Hospital Vicentino, Ponta Grossa, Paraná.


METHODS
The technique included vertical (sleeve) gastrectomy, omentectomy and enterectomy that retained three meters of small bowel (initial jejunum and most of the ileum), i.e. the lower limit for normal adults. The operations on 100 patients are described.


RESULTS
The mean follow-up was nine months (range: one to 29 months). The mean reductions in body mass index were 4.3, 6.1, 8.1, 10.1 and 10.7 kg/m2, respectively at 1, 2, 4, 6 and 12 months. All patients reported early satiety. There was major improvement in comorbidities, especially diabetes. Operative complications occurred in 7% of patients, all of them resolved without sequelae. There was no mortality.


CONCLUSIONS
This procedure creates a proportionally reduced gastrointestinal tract, leaving its basic functions unharmed and producing adaptation of the gastric chamber size to hypercaloric diet. It removes the sources of ghrelin, plasminogen activator inhibitor-1 (PAI-1) and resistin production and leads more nutrients to the distal bowel, with desirable metabolic consequences. Patients do not need nutritional support or drug medication. The procedure is straightforward and safe.
Santoro
Sérgio
S
Hospital Israelita Albert Einstein, São Paulo, Brazil. ssantoro@ajato.com.br
Velhote
Manoel Carlos Prieto
MC
Malzoni
Carlos Eduardo
CE
Milleo
Fábio Quirino
FQ
Klajner
Sidney
S
Campos
Fábio Guilherme
FG
D000222:Adaptation, Physiological; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D050110:Bariatric Surgery / Q000379:methods*; D015992:Body Mass Index; D004063:Digestion / Q000502:physiology*; D013505:Digestive System Surgical Procedures / Q000009:adverse effects / Q000379:methods*; D004766:Enterostomy / Q000379:methods; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D005743:Gastrectomy / Q000379:methods; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009767:Obesity, Morbid / Q000503:physiopathology / Q000601:surgery*; D009852:Omentum / Q000601:surgery; D016896:Treatment Outcome; D015431:Weight Loss / Q000502:physiology