Weight loss surgery has developed considerably in the past 50 years and modern forms of surgery such as gastric lap band surgery are authentically a lot safer and carry far fewer complications than early forms of open gastric bypass surgery. Nevertheless, there are risks and these should be fully discussed with your surgeon before embarking on surgery.
Gastric lap band surgery carries a amount of risks which are specific to this form of surgery but it also carries the same risks that come will all major surgeries. In addition, there are a amount of normal risks which accompany any surgery inviting patients who are overweight.
The first and most serious risk is that of death occurring whether during surgery or shortly after and directly linked to surgery. At this early stage (gastric lap band surgery has been around for some 12 years now but has only been licensed for use in the United States since 2001) very few deaths have been reported and it is difficult to give a figure, although it is generally held that the risk of death from gastric lap band surgery is less than 1%.
It is inviting to note that in one study in Australia no deaths at all were reported amongst a group of 2700 patients who have undergone laparoscopic adjustable gastric banding surgery since 1994. It should be said however that Australia has been in the forefront of pioneering the use of the laparoscopic adjustable gastric band and that over 90% of all weight loss surgeries conducted in Australia now use this method. This is essential as, in interpreting data from this study, it should be borne in mind that the caress of the surgeon is a very essential factor in terms of both risk and complication. Surgeons with essential caress of this technique (having performed at least 100 procedures) show a very much higher success rate.
Many of the risks during surgery are normal rather than "lap band" specific and are base surgical risks linked with such things as your age, weight, reaction to anesthesia and the presence of disease (whether or not this is directly linked to your weight problem). The main "lap band" specific risk during surgery is that of gastric perforation (a tear in the wall of the stomach) which occurs in about 1% of cases.
The vast majority of complications will occur following gastric lap band surgery and most patients (in one Us study the outline was as high as 88%) will caress some form of complication in the weeks and months following surgery. Such complications will not necessarily be serious and will range from mild to severe.
Approximately half of all patients will suffer varying degrees of nausea and vomiting and in the region of one-third of patients will also suffer from regurgitation (gastroesophageal reflux). About a quarter of patients will caress a slippage of the band and about one patient in seven will caress a blockage of the duct in the middle of the two sections of the stomach.
Other moderate to severe problems following gastric lap band surgery can include erosion of the band into the stomach and twisting or leakage of the entrance port. Strangeness in swallowing (dysphagia), constipation and diarrhea are also quite common.
In a very small amount of patients (less than 1%) a whole series of non-series complications may arise together with (but not dinky to) inflammation of the stomach (gastritis), migration of the stomach above the diaphragm (hiatal hernia), inflammation of the pancreas (pancreatitis), dehydration, abdominal pain, gas (flatulence), chest pain and infection.
In normal gastric lap band surgery, particularly when performed laparoscopically, carries fewer risks and complications than other forms of weight loss surgery, but these risks are nonetheless essential and should be fully discussed with your surgeon and understood before any decision is taken to undergo surgery.
Abdominal Surgery:The Risks Of Gastric Lap Band surgical operation