Qatar will soon upgrade national guidelines for bariatric (weight loss) surgeries to comply with the recommendations by international bodies, says a senior official.
The new guidelines for bariatric surgeries will reduce the required body mass index (BMI) for people with serious weight-related health problem.
The required BMI for bariatric surgeries for people with chronic diseases is to be reduced from 35 to 30 complying with new international standards, said Dr Moataz M Bashah, Director, Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery at Hamad Medical Corporation (HMC).
The BMI is a key factor in deciding overweight. It shows the association between a person’s weight and height. At present, if an adult’s BMI is over 40 or the BMI is 35 and has health conditions such as diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, high cholesterol or depression, the person could choose to undergo weight loss surgery.
“Bariatric surgeries are done for people with bad obesity. We do it for people with a BMI more than 40 eve if they don’t have any complicated diseases. For people with chronic diseases previously the BMI was 35, but now with a significant increase in number of patients with diabetes and hypertension many international bodies are recommending to do the surgery starting with BMI 30. It has been implemented in some countries including Kuwait and India,” said Dr Bashah.
“The National Bariatric Guidelines will be updated in another two months and it will include BMI starting with 30 for people with conditions like diabetes and hypertension,” he added.
Between 800 and 1,000 bariatric surgeries are conducted at Hamad General Hospital and Wakra Hospital, per year.
There are two basic methods of weight loss surgery- Restrictive surgery and Malabsorptive surgery. Restrictive surgery decreases food intake by creating a small upper stomach pouch to limit food intake. Malabsorptive surgery will alter digestion, thus causing the food to be poorly digested and incompletely absorbed.
HMC is also preparing to introduce a new less invasive weight loss procedure which helps the patient to recover much faster. “We will soon introduce a new weight loss tool which is an inflatable balloon. Patients will swallow a capsule containing a balloon and after six months to one year will pass it with stool, ” said Dr Bashah.
The main effect of the balloon is that its slows the passage of food and liquid through the stomach. This makes the person feel fuller quicker and longer and substantially reduces the amount they need to eat to feel comfortably full."
“The average stomach is approximately 1.5 liter in volume, and so the average balloon (filled to 650 ml) reduces the volume of the stomach by less than 50 percent,” said Dr Bashah.
