PORDENONE – Thanks to television, by bariatric surgery we talk about it more and more and so we discover, among other things, that this type of interventions reserved for those suffering from severe obesityin Friuli Venezia Giulia they were done first at the Santa Maria degli Angeli in Pordenone thanks to the foresight of Giovanni Fanti who, together with the “young” Alessandro Patanè and Matteo Faion, is part of the medical team that takes care of the process which in the end takes the patient to the operating room (Paolo Ubiali directs the entire staff of the Department of General Surgery). Once again, time has not been kind to the hospital situation in Pordenone and covid did the rest, so much so that at the beginning surgical interventions there were about a hundred a year, now it is down to around seventy due to the now structural shortage of staff (understood not only as doctors, but also as nurses) which has meant that now, in the best case scenario, it is possible to do up to seven operating sessions of the entire surgery per day, compared to 11 a few years ago. Having made the necessary assumptions, the team that deals with bariatric surgery every week gives three obese people the opportunity to become patients and therefore be able to live a different life. Improve.
THE DOCTOR
Doctor Alessandro Patanè talks about this type of intervention, which is often talked about without the necessary knowledge. «The path is well traced: we have a clinic available that allows us three visits a week to establish whether the person is a candidate or not. If positive, we move on to routine tests, including a visit to a psychologist, to highlight any problems that prevent the patient from having surgery.” And it is the BMI that sets the pace: obesity must be third degree, with a BMI greater than 40. Or second degree if heart disease, hypertension and diabetes are present. And you must be between 18 and 65 years old. «For some patients it is absolutely a life-saving operation – continues Patanè -: gastretcomia shrinks the stomach and if you eat too much it causes nausea and vomiting. The stomach is no longer a reservoir.” As regards gastric bypass, Santa Maria degli Angeli is among the few hospitals to use the surgical robot.
OBESITY
It’s not just eating disorders that cause obesity. “Poor food hygiene and a sedentary lifestyle” are also among the culprits. «And the patient must know that it is not the surgeon who makes him lose weight, but the patient himself. Then there is a small share of obese people who are obese due to metabolic syndrome, a set of factors that causes metabolic disorders.” A path for which therefore not only surgeons are needed, but also psychologists and nutritionists. In addition to all those figures who are not purely medical without whom the journey is not possible. Yes, because even in this case there could be more patients, given that obesity is on the increase. But the reduction of staff at all levels does not allow this door to be opened to more patients.
