What is Gastric Sleeve?

In this video, Dr. Erik Lough explains gastric sleeve surgery, also known as laparoscopic sleeve gastrectomy or VSG, one of the most common weight loss procedures today. It reduces stomach size, limits food intake, and decreases hunger through hormonal changes. The minimally invasive surgery takes about an hour, with most patients going home the same day and experiencing significant, long-term weight loss and metabolic benefits.

TRANSCRIPT

Hi welcome to today’s video I’m Dr. Erik Lough a general surgeon in Capital Surgeons Group & Southwest Bariatric Surgeons. I specialize in hiatal hernia, gastro-esophageal reflux, and weight loss surgery. I answer common questions patients ask me about general surgery and weight loss surgery. In today’s video I answer the question what is gastric sleeve?

Gastric sleeve is one of the names for a laparoscopic sleeve gastrectomy. You may also hear it called vertical sleeve gastrectomy, VSG, but for short most people simply call it gastric sleeve. It is one of the most common weight loss surgeries performed today. Cleveland clinic reported that about 150,000 gastric sleeves are performed annually in the United States and about 380,000 worldwide. It is either performed using standard laparoscopy or with a robot. I usually do a robotic gastric sleeve and I’ve already made a video about what is robotic surgery that you can check out.

Once a patient is asleep under general anesthesia, I make several small incisions on the abdomen. I put my camera through one incision and my working instruments through the other incisions. I dissect around the outer part of the stomach to free up its attachments and then I use a surgical stapler to make a tube shape out of the stomach which is where the gastric sleeve gets its name. Then the outer part of the stomach is removed from the body. This leaves behind a much smaller stomach about a tenth of size. So when you eat, food comes in to the smaller stomach, you feel full with a very small amount of food but you also feel satisfied by that small amount. Even if you wanted to eat another bite, there is just no more room. Also the hormones that make you feel hungry were produced in that other part of the stomach that is now removed, so your metabolism is improved by increased fullness and decreased hunger. With a gastric sleeve, there are no new connections made during surgery so food comes into the stomach and leaves through the natural exit.

Surgery takes about 1 hour and I send most patient home the same day. My average patient starts out with a BMI in the 40s and over the course of a year loses weight to a BMI in the mid to high 20s once their body reaches its new set point. So what is gastric sleeve? It is a laparoscopic often outpatient bariatric procedure for weight loss that reduces how much and how fast a person can eat, creating lifelong significant weight loss and metabolism improvement.