Any vets out there???

@Valerie G. 

You're a lot farther out than I am (I'm only 2.5 years post-VSG), and I respect your experience and observations.  

However, I have a reaction to your post above that a regain of 25% of excess weight lot is a "normal bounceback."  It sounds to me like you're implying that one should expect it and shouldn't be alarmed by it.  Perhaps I've misunderstood what you're saying.  

However, I see others here (and elsewhere) who have not regained after successfully maintaining for several years or who, if they have regained a smaller amount than 25%, lose their regain by refocusing on increasing their WLS eating/behavioral compliance.  

Therefore, I question that significant regain is inevitable.  But again, I may have misunderstood the point you were making.  

 

Here is the link to one of many articles for sleeve expectations.  These are statistics, which don't lie.  It also doesn't mean that you can't beat those statistics, but it won't be without working hard at it.

Even the DS, being the most drastic with the best statistical results since 1988 has a 15-20% bounceback rate of ewl. I am sitting at 14% myself, and I'm not at all alarmed and I won't panic about it either.  If that's where my body wants to be, I'll be comfortable with a size 10.

 

Despite being the best weapon against obesity, bariatric bypass surgery is no 'magic solution' for keeping weight off.

 

Now that a third of Americans are obese, doctors are working to treat the problem using a variety of methods and tools.

One such way is bariatric surgery, but new research suggests that one common form of the procedure doesn't automatically keep the weight off.

The research, published Wednesday in the American Medical Association's journal JAMA Surgery, examined long-term effects of laparoscopic sleeve gastrectomy. 

The researchers concluded that after five years, nearly half of patients experienced significant weight gain. 

   

Laparoscopic sleeve gastrectomy, or LSG, has become a popular weight loss surgery in the United States because it's covered by major insurance carriers.

The procedure removes the majority of a patient's stomach, resulting in a tube-like structure about a quarter of its original size.

Besides weight loss, the surgery has been shown to reduce a patient's risk of diabetes, high cholesterol, and hypertension. Patients who are obese and have one of these other conditions are often candidates for LSG and other bariatric surgeries.

Prior research has shown LSGs to be effective for short-term weight loss in 90 percent of young patients. It also reduces their risk of other serious conditions by 70 percent in the first two years after their surgeries.

Other studies suggest that it's a superior weight-loss tool to other surgeries, like laparoscopic adjustable gastric banding.

But the new research suggests that the surgery alone isn't enough to benefit obese patients in the long run.

Read More: 'Healthy Obesity' Debunked »

Immediate Benefits Don't Last Forever

The surgical process may be irreversible, but its protective effects aren't necessarily permanent. 

Dr. Andrei Keidar, of Beilinson Hospital in Petah Tikva, Israel, and his colleagues, examined data from 443 patients who underwent LSGs from the same surgical team, between 2006 and 2013.

Researchers found that while excess weight loss was at 77 percent after a year, it decreased to 56 percent after five years. Diabetes remission was promising at 51 percent after a year, but only 20 percent after five years. 

Remission of hypertension, however, remained steady at 46 percent from the first to fifth year. 

"The longer follow-up data revealed weight regain and a decrease in remission rates for type 2 diabetes mellitus and other obesity-related comorbidities," the study authors concluded. "These data should be taken into consideration in the decision-making process for the most appropriate operation for a given obese patient."

And you will also find others out on the WLS Revisions board that have VSG and seeking revisions to DS or RNY because either they didn't lose enough or regained with a vengeance.  After years of dieting, losing and regaining, many of us have "broken" metabolisms, that eating less isn't going to solve. It has little to do with how they work their tool much of the time.  

Thank you, Valerie.  

I'm new to the OH forum, so I don't know many old-timers here or their histories.  What's your WLS surgery history -- which procedures and how long ago (if you don't mind sharing)?  

Thanks,

Ann

I had a duodenal switch back in 2005. The VSG wasn't in the mainstream as a stand alone procedure yet. It was the first step of a 2 part DS if the patient was too large or sickly to do it all at once.

Thanks, Valerie.