Laparoscopic Surgery for Morbid Obesity

Obesity is a chronic, debilitating, life long disease giving rise to many other diseases. Severe obesity is associated with co-morbidities including type 2 DM, hypertension, dyslipidemia, obstructive sleep apnoea, obesity hypoventilation syndrome, polycystic ovarian syndrome, stateohepatosis, asthma, back and lower limb degenerative problem, cancer and premature death. Morbid obesity has acquired epidemic proportions in the west. Traditional approaches to weight loss including diet, exercise and medication achieve no more than 5–10 % reduction in body weight with high relapse rates. So far, there was no effective remedy for morbid obesity. Bariatric surgery is the only effective means of achieving long term weight loss in the severely obese. The international guideline for bariatric surgery are BMI > 40 kg/m2 BMI > 35 kg/m2 together with obesity related disease. Bariatric surgery can achieve sustained weight loss durable to at least 15 years and causes marked improvement in co-morbidities.