PIMS to set up weight-loss surgery unit

Trained surgeons will trim stomach of patients suffering from type-two diabetes, obesity

ISLAMABAD: The Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (Pims) will establish a dedicated weight-loss surgery unit for people suffering from type-two diabetes and obesity, a top official of the health facility said on Wednesday.

The dedicated metabolic and bariatric surgery department will offer a procedure that helps in averting the complications of diabetes and cardiovascular diseases due to obesity.

The decision was taken in the backdrop of training sessions being conducted by the American Surgeon Dr Robert Rutledge, the inventor of the laparoscopic mini gastric bypass, who is currently on a weeklong visit to train Pakistani surgeons.

Pims Executive Director Dr Raja Amjad Mehmood, during a meeting with the surgeons participating in the training from different cities, decided that he will soon establish the dedicated metabolic and bariatric surgery department at the health facility.



It was decided that existing facilities at Pims can be immediately upgraded by procuring advanced equipment needed for the surgery which at a cost of up to Rs40 million.

The meeting observed that diabetes and obesity were on the rise in Pakistan at an alarming rate and will be a pandemic within a decade if measures were not taken as per new research.

The government spends billions on complications of diabetes which includes treatment for heart disease, stroke, blindness, renal failure and gangrene of limbs needing amputation, doctors pointed out during the meeting.

Metabolic or bariatric surgery has shown to be effective in curing or at least controlling the complications of diabetes and obesity better than the currently available medical treatment, said Dr Aatif Inam Shami. Dr Shami, who has been working as an associate professor in the Department of General Surgery at Pims, has been performing metabolic surgery on obese and diabetic patients with great success since 2015.

However, he said, the efforts were constrained due to lack of advanced equipment needed for such surgeries which incur extra cost on patients.

Surgeon in town

Dr Rutledge had conducted a two-day certification course on March 9 and 10, which was participated by surgeons from all over Pakistan. The second training had been scheduled for March 16 and 17.

Dr Rutledge, who invented the procedure in 1997 and has been conducting it for the past 20 years, said it was basically a trick which came to him when he saw a patient who had been shot multiple times in his stomach. He saved him by trimming his stomach.

Then he thought to use this trick on patients with diabetes and obesity by trimming and cutting the short parts of their stomach and the long tract of food gut.

Dr Rutledge said he was initially afraid of coming to Pakistan but his visit had shown him that the fears were unfounded

“My host was kind and I found the surgeons participating in the training as skilled and expert as anywhere in the world,” he said. 

Published in The Express Tribune, March 15^th, 2018.