This has been used in Europe for some time. Had a friend who had one. It was much less invasive and she lost the weight and KEPT it off. She was very pleased with the results and the improvement in her health.

Eat Less! Exercise! Walk to the supermarket!

Nobody really needs these bands, balance your diet and eat half of the humongous rations you are having now.

I know that many people will start yelling This will be easier and less dangerous than having the band.

I know that a lot of people will start yelling about different diseases that make people obese, but none of this diseases will make anybody obese without an excessive intake of food!

Ram,

it is hard for people with multiple diseases to exercise. For example, take someone with crippling disc disease or hip or knee problems. It is cheaper to aggressively treat and save the cost of treatment for chronic diseases.

I hope to G-d you never get a severe illness that deforms your appearance. I doubt you could take the emotional stress. Bullies rarely can.

I don't have any problem with this policy. I do know, however, that lap band surgery is useless unless the patient is really willing to change their eating habits. My brother-in-law had it thinking that it would miraculously make him thin but he didn't change any of his eating habits and, after a small initial weight loss, his weight has gone back up. The knee replacement surgery he was hoping to avoid is now scheduled.

Scott,

Do you really think that most obese people are obese because they have health problems which prevent exercise? Some, certainly, but most?

People become obese from eating too much and not burning off enough of the calories they consume. People who cannot exercise due to illness or physical restraints should cut back on their intake of food. It's not rocket science my friends! We get fat because we eat too much and exercise too little. We have access to way too much food via drive ins, buffets, etc. We keep too much junk food and sweets in the cupboards as well. 50 years ago a kid was lucky to get a home baked cookie and a glass of milk after school before going outside to play ball or ride bikes. Now kids get handed twinkies by the box and sugary juice boxes to munch while they sit on their butts playing Wii.

I am one of those people who had a disease that caused my weight gain. I went from being 5 ft 6 and 106lbs to 212lbs in nine months. I was diagnosed with thyroid cancer went through two surgeries in 3 months then radio therapy six months after that. The oncologists would not put me on any replacement therapy during this time so that any remining cancer would be starved and would be obliterated by the I-131 isotope. I have always exercised and eaten correctly. I have been put on diet pills to increase my metabolism, been to a nutrionist, decreased my caloric intake to 1000 calories a day (sometimes less) while increasing my caloric output and still have not lost the weight. My doctor and I have discussed this procedure but since my BMI is only 35 and I have no other disease, insurance will not pay for it. For those who think you can change habits and that is the solution, sometimes that solution does not work. Have been trying it for the 9 years since the weight gain to no avail. So tell me all you skeptics, should I become anorexic because your reasoning and suggestions has not worked since my thyroid has been removed. And yes, my thyroid hormone replacement meds are at a correct level - in fact, my doctor has me at a high dose making me borderline hyperthyroid.

BS Dr. Joeseph. Here in San Diego I see people exercising daily, riding arm driven bikes because they have no legs or running on artificial ones or blind people stoking a bicycle built for two. There are annual triathlons here designed solely for those folks. Yes there are quadriplegics but then why isn't Stephen Hawking obese? The problem isn't disabilities it is depression. You are merely treating the symptom of them eating themselves to death. Many will find other ways to kill themselves such as drinking or smoking themselves to death instead. They need therapy not surgery.

I agree that there is a lack of exercise and nutrition, especially in America. However, obesity is a serious health condition and many people cannot control Hypothyroid conditions, diabetes, and many other illness that cause significant weight gain. You are ignorant to the medical profession and really need to research obesity and the causes before commenting.

TNBrad526

Do your own research -

It also has been shown that losing weight lowers the risk and reduces the symptoms of diabetes.

Many people on this forum seem to be arguing that 'most overweight people' have some medical condition or injury that prevents them from losing weight', and that simply is not true.

Wow--it is so great to see people with their tiny exposure to reality contradicting people who actually know what they are talking about. Most overweight people do have a problem that prevents them from losing weight--it is called being overweight.

When one becomes overweight--whether due to being unable to afford quality food, having a job which is highly stressful but causes people to be virtually inert during the day, developing a temporary illness or physical problem, developing a chronic illness or physical problem, being given a medication which causes weight gain but having a doctor who does not take the symptom seriously--one stays overweight.

There are many imbeciles who insist that weight is a matter of calories in and calories out--implying that obese people must be lazy pigs--despite the many, many studies which show that people today eat a healthier diet and get more exercise in their free time than in the past.

Our workplaces have dramatically changed--people who would have spent their workday up and moving around now sit in a chair and stare at a computer (at all three of their part-time jobs because there are no fulltime jobs for people at that level). Our food supply has dramatically changed (being packed with corn products and meat and dairy loaded with growth hormones). It has been absolutely demonstrated, for example, that a middle-aged woman would have to do an hour of aerobics every single day in order to maintain her weight. Want to stop and figure out what it would take if one wanted to lose weight?

There are people who get on discussion boards like this and brag about being weight lifters or runners or whatever, implying that their results are typical and the rest of us must be lazy idiots. You know, there are people who shoot heroin every day for decades and their are people who smoke like chimneys every day--and they live to be in their 90s. I don't think, though, that this is a typical result. People--if these studies don't describe your own life, it's because you probably have either a higher metabolism than normal or because you can't taste your food (people who have a weak sense of taste tend to eat less and eat the "good diet" foods that taste like cardboard because everything tastes like cardboard to them).

The idiot woman who talks about seeing disabled people being physically active in San Diego (a military town, for god's sake) should stop and think about how those disabled people got disabled in the first place--very likely they were males who jumped into a swimming pool and broke their necks or males who got themselves into motorcycle or automobile accidents or they were soldiers. People who are adreneline junkies stay adreneline junkies. The good doctor was talking about people with degenerative diseases of the spine, joints, and other debilitating illnesses--not people who were injured on the job or doing sports.

Once you put on weight, you are keeping that weight. It will not go anywhere without herculean efforts (unless you happen to be one of the lucky 20% for whom diet and exercise work). Some of us have jobs and lives and cannot dedicate our entire days around becoming slightly less obese.

You know--there is a point past which the people who read studies like this and disbelieve them need to, perhaps, STFU. Go and read a cookbook from the 1920s or 1950s and look at the high carb, high fat, high calorie stuff that was typical fair at that time. Go watch a documentary and note that people did not go to the gym or run every day or "exercise religiously." Yet, they were thinner. Get a freaking clue--the environment has changed, not people. We need to focus on environmental causes and figure out how to keep children from putting on weight in the first place--only in that way can people become thinner.

Anyway--all the obese people will die young, not get on Social Security or Medicare, not wind up in old folks homes, not develop Alzheimer's or dementia, and will not eat up $$$$. This leaves more $$$$ for you smarmy, annoying, know-it-all twits to eat up in your old age when you, too, develop health problems. So, it's really in your best interests that others are obese anyway--again, STFU.

beanathome, you are right in much of your post when describing how our modern lives are more sedentary. thus leading to much chubbiness. Diet is however a great contributor to obesity. Sure, many of us eat healthier than previous generations, but most Americans eat like they are 20. I have always worked in air conditioned offices, in front of a computer, and I have managed to keep slim (harder to do cause I am quite short) by hitting the gym regularly. When I went to college in my late 20's I gained 15lbs of abdominal fat because it is harder to eat correctly and exercise regularly when schoolin'. But as soon as I gradumacated I started hitting the iron again and trimmed my diet to something more appropriate for the metabolism of a 30 year old and now I am 10lbs lighter.

The moral of the story? Virtually everyone out there who is obese/overweight could loose at least some of the weight. The problem is that we make to many excuses and believe that there is nothing we can actually do to change.

The FDA (aka MONSANTO) is all for profits. While the FDA lets GMO foods on the market and tries to ban or control vitamins and supplements, we are getting sicker and sicker while Monsanto is getting richer and richer. And the sicker we get the more big pharma sells us drugs and comes up with new diseases. The newest one? Adults who are picky eaters NOW have a disorder.

In 1999 the FDA was found to have over 40,000 internal documents showing GMO foods were a serious health risk. GMO's cause diseases, obesity, digestive disorders, cancer, allergies and the list goes on and on. The result? NOTHING. People don't care what they eat.

If YOU think the FDA has YOUR best health in mind, I have some oceanfront property I will sell you in MN.

Endorse naturally produced foods and reduce medical expenditures on chronic, diet-induced health problems? Where's the money in that?

Hel-LO, somebody has to keep them in their jobs...

Patrick, exactly where my line of thought was.

It is sad to contemplate the newly accepted "circle of life": aka: food cycle.

What will happen when that Safeway card I use (or any other swipe method of tracking) spits out the data that we never buy pork or chicken? Just wait for an unassuming survey to come out asking about food buying habits and fines generated, or regulations put in place for growing your own food or supporting "buy local" farmers markets.

And after that? Having your health insurance, aka: "keep me sick insurance", canceled when you don't go on the drugs suggested/prescribed. With medical records all on (or soon to be) a central data base, if that doctors slip for Lipitor isn't filled, it will be easily flagged.

(...and I'm only a little bit of a conspiracy theorist. :-)

Would you rather pay for 1 hospital day and 1 procedure for these people or hundreds of hospital days from the chronic diseases from morbid obesity? Save the moralizing for someone else's pocketbook, my friend. It is cheaper to treat before the nightmare starts.

Actually you automatically assume that being thinner will automatically make you healthier. Look at some people in Africa. I know a lot of people who eat a bunch of junk, but just dont eat a lot of it. They are sick. The focus should be on what we are eating, not just how much.

Scott A Joseph, MD #3.1,

And what percentage of people who go through this or simular procedures, and continue to eat like there's no tomorrow and now they weigh more than before the procedure?

Dr. Joseph - I'd rather pay for neither.

Stop your own moralizing about whether or not I have the right to object to people who think there should be no consequences for their actions, and who think that 'someone else' should always pay.

Abstinence is impossible but moderation is not. I know several people who have had weight loss surgery and guess what? They gained most of their weight back. What a waste of money.

Yes, it is impossible to abstain from food, unless one is willing to starve to death.

However, self-control is possible.

The FDA is working in conjunction with medical device companies that want to sell Americans more ways to avoid taking responsibility for their own actions.

Dr. Joseph - would you be willing to support the use of a 'financial lap band' for people who find it impossible to abstain from overspending with their credit cards?

what would keep heath care cost down is limit how much hospitals , insurance comp, and medical staff can charge/wages.YES it includes malpractice that one is easy ..Dr and medical staff screws up Pull their lic in all states you know the same standard as truck drivers and CDL

Insurance should cover---it prevents more serious CHRONIC diseases later. Hospital days are the major cost factor in medicine. Reduce them. Lap band surgery is done in Day surgery.

Brian - what would keep health care costs WAY down would be for people to take responsibility for their own actions and to stop looking for so many devices and pills to 'fix' what they can fix themselves.

Dr Joseph - 'insurance should cover it'? That's the magic money pool which everyone is entitled too, so that they never have to pay for anything on their own, right?

michael anderson...Do you have 2 knees that need replacment, an artificial hip, 2-discs out of your lower back, an artificial right shoulder and the left one not far behind?...No?...Then shut up, you arrogant POS...

Micheal,

You and your wife may be "in shape" but you are arrogant, insensitive, and obnoxious. I'd rather be fat!

I agree that at some point, drastic measures may be in order.

Charles, did the structural issues you list happen as a result of being over weight or after they were a problem was it the inability to get around that caused the weight problem?

With so many things, what comes first, the chicken or the egg? Treat the effect, not thecause?

My mother-in-law is an emotional eater and has been very over weight for years. New knees, the whole 9 yards. Hundreds of diets. Lots of money spent. But the bottom line is she is still an emotional eater that now has to deal with her inability to get around and a body plagued with the disfunction caused by years of chemical "remedy's". A viscous circle.

Fat-bashing is one of the last socially-acceptable hatreds. I've seen people scream themselves purple spewing bigotry of all kinds, based on race, religion, sexual orientation, gender etc., and this is just one more. We are so quick to judge, point fingers, moralize and hate. I think it must be in our DNA!

If this is helping some people, why not allow them to choose it? I don't have to do it if I don't want to, but that shouldn't stop you as long as it doesn't hurt me in the process.

Insurance - the nature of insurance currently is that they will pay to deliver a baby, but not for the birth-control pills to prevent the baby. Insurance will mostly intervene when a chronic condition has arrived, instead of prevention. Dr. Joseph is right when he says that hospitalizations are what drive up the cost of medical coverage. All the hating of people who are not perfect isn't going to change that. Whether they eat too much or too little or not the right foods, or they smoke, or drink, or take recreational drugs or don't exercise enough does not mean they don't deserve treatment to help them regain their health! Medicine is not based on morality, it is based on helping people who suffer. "First, do no harm" is part of the hippocratic oath our doctors take. It's against their nature to throw people into harm's way.

dht923nh

Whether they eat too much or too little or not the right foods, or they smoke, or drink, or take recreational drugs or don't exercise enough does not mean they don't deserve treatment to help them regain their health!

Yes, in some situations it does mean that.

Calling people 'fat-bashers' because they do not want to pay for others' poor choices is not an argument - it is merely a descent into the same kind of 'bashing' you pretend to condemn.

And no, as with so many of his other comments, Dr. Joseph is not right when he makes the blanket statement that 'hospitalizations are what drive up the cost of medical coverage'.

Unnecessary hospitalizations do drive up the cost, but not all hospitalizations are necessary - just as prescribing lap band procedures for anyone who is unwilling to change their eating habits and develop self-discipline is always the answer - this too will drive up the cost of medical coverage.

If you want to contribute your money to people who have ruined their health thought the use of 'recreational drugs' (hah!), please do so. But please do not campaign for laws or regulations that force everyone else to make that contribution.

Must be easy to be born skinny. You should be ashamed- just because you are skinny does not give you the right to be such a judgmental jerk. You should have compassion for those who have weight issues cause it is not as simple as you think to lose weight. People like you are who cause our children to go to school and become judgemental bullies. We sould be teaching them understanding and kindness not hate and predjudice!

Lyndsey-2759174

Please stop judging - you should be ashamed for judging people for making comments.

Way to turn a discussion about obesity into an anti-religion diatribe. I suppose no atheists are overweight?

Seriously. Continue to work out, and I mean a real workout, and leave the product that you sell alone. Surgery is the last thing that any rational person would want to have. There is a reason why the procedures are called invasive.

I am one that was constantly hungry, regardless of what I eat, how much water I drink or how much I exercise. That's not really a way to live. I had the band done over 5 years ago, and I would change NOTHING about it. I can now eat reasonable portions, and not be hungry until it's time for the next meal. The band is not really near as invasive as the bypass. Yes, it's surgery and there are risks, but there is a point where the benefits outweight that small risk. It's done laparoscopically, and nowadays, it's basically outpatient surgery.

Good for you calicokj!

But that procedure is irreversible and carries many more risks.

I have a cheaper and far more cost effective method! How about we just let people who lack the self discipline to take care of themselves die because they deserve to just like smokers?

Why should others pay higher insurance premiums because some moron can't stop munching away on those fat laden McDonald's lunches, etc.

I'm not interested in hearing the poor Jane stories from people that are too lazy to suck it up and exercise some discipline in their lives.

Sorry you feel that way. Alot of heavy overweight people really try to keep their weight down.

Being judgemental on this issue only makes the problem worse. Alot of people who are certain medications have no control of weight gain as well. So I hope that you are very thin and stay that way.

I am not overweight but I do have empathy for those who are and try so hard to control it. Some Doctors now a days don't give a hoot about their patients. Someone comes in for a diet evaluation it's easier to tell them to have surgery then to actually work. I mean work with them on nutrition, and how to offset perhaps some medication they may be taking.

I gained 75 lbs taking a medication. I was counseled by my doctor, and we found a different alternative to the medication. I lost the weight.

What most don't realize because we look at overweight people as something less the human is they could be starving themselves and still gain weight. When you don't eat what your body needs in nutrition, (i.e. starving yourself) your body stores fat. Once again proving you can gain weight and still starve yourself.

I read these posts and I am so sorry so many of you think overweight people don't fight this issue each and every day of their lives. That you think they are pathetic and overeaters. I hope and pray for you all you stay thin and lean.

I for one will reach a hand out to anyone who is overweight and is trying to beat it.

Kinda sad this article came out several weeks after Michel Obama was visiting schools in Washington and scaring small children into believing they will have to have this surgery.

Once again - people are reacting to blind bull going around in the news.

I hope we are still a free enough country that what Michele Obama was saying to small school children will not become a norm in the Free Country. That we will in time find patience with people who for one reason or another have problems with their weight.

My mother was 200 lbs 5'6". Why you may ask, well let's see she was pregnant 7 times (body retains fat from pregnancy) had 14 different operations including hysterectomy, gallblatter, stomach. All of which were done cutting muscle and all of which made her appear heavier then she actually was. Till the day she died she tried everything to lose the weight, when finally one doctor told her - due to the cutting of muscle and due to the childbirths she had and due to age and due to her body slowing down in metabolizing food she will remain this way. No amount of excercise will change it. My mother did not eat like a pig, nor was she lazy, nor was she happy about this. But even this surgery approach would not have helped her.

So Smit I hope and pray you aren't an american - if you are perhaps a trip to a socialized country would make you feel better - being with all thin people, because they can't afford to eat.

so first of all trader, I have no idea what being an American has to do with this issue - or what a socialized country has to do with it. This is a human issue - not an American issue.

Your mother is a perfect example of what is wrong with the healthcare system and the state of well being in this country to begin with. Being an American these days - seems to mean - you can do and create whatever you want as a business and to hell be damned any sort of common sense related to health. Our food is loaded with chemicals, hormones, anti-biotics, and last but not least corn syrup. The FDA - an American institution - is charged with protecting consumers, yet they time and again side with big agriculture, big pharma and now it would seem big medical device companies.

Yes, people are obese, yes, people have a hard time losing weight but weight for the vast majority of young obese people is about the choices they are making. I'm not blaming them, our entire society is set-up for fast food, boxed lunches, TV dinners - none of which have one ounce of nutrition. So - what do we teach our kids regarding health - nothing good. What's the result: obesity, heart disease, diabetes, cancer - all because the food we put in our pie holes isn't worth the packaging it's delivered in.

So just what is it about being American related to health that you think we should be hanging our hat on and flying the flag for?