Is weight loss surgery for you?

If you have been overweight /obese for many years and have tried to lose weight in many ways—maybe with a commercial program or a nutritionist or with your doctor or just by doing it yourself, you know how difficult it is to lose weight. It is difficult to lose beyond a certain point, the weight just won't come off anymore. It is difficult to keep the weight off. The moment you stop the diet, the weight just comes back and faster and more than before.

Many patients that come to us have developed other medical problems related to obesity. Such problems are:

  • Diabetes
  • High blood pressure
  • Sleep apnea
  • High cholesterol
  • Heart disease
  • Acid reflux
  • Joint problems
  • Shortness of breath
  • Asthma
  • Menstrual problems
  • Urine incontinence
  • Swollen ankles
  • Depression
  • Cancer

Weight Loss Surgery/Bariatric Surgery may improve or cure these problems in many patients.

The Weight Loss Surgery team at Roger Williams Medical Center with the surgeons Dr. Dieter Pohl and Dr. Jeannine Giovanni, has 9 years of experience and operated on more than 1500 patients with good results. Since 2005, the team has been designated a Bariatric Surgery Center of Excellence by the national American Society of Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery.

  1. Weight loss surgery/Bariatric Surgery is a great way to loose weight and to keep it off. We have many very happy patients. Many patients have improved their quality of life and improved their medical problems.

But it is nor for everyone. Following is a list of qualifications that a person has to fulfill in order to be accepted in a Weight Loss Surgery program/Bariatric Surgery program at Roger Williams Medical Center under the care of Dr. Pohl and Dr. Giovanni. These qualifications are similar in all hospitals in the USA.

  • Minimum age is 18. There is no maximum age.
  • If you have no serious medical problem, your Body Mass Index (BMI) needs to be 40 or higher than 40.
  • If you do have medical problems that are caused by obesity (diabetes, etc) then the BMI only needs to be 35 or higher than 35.