Hi and welcome to the question of the week, I’m Dr. Alvarez. In this video I’d like to discuss a little more about the gastric sleeve procedure that we started doing many years ago and now has become very popular because of the benefits and amazing results and the low-risk involved. This is a restrictive procedure that will limit the amount of food you can eat and will help you feel full sooner. It is done through laparoscopy or minimal invasive surgery with very small incisions on the abdomen. The procedure involves a resection and removal of a portion of the stomach so your capacity is greatly reduced. This means that on average if you are eating on a scale from 1-10, you are eating a 10, with the gastric sleeve you will be eating a 3. This means you will be eating less that half of what you currently eat, eating pretty much any type of food and losing weight. Depending on the surgeon, this resection may be between 60-80% of the stomach. The remainder of the stomach is left in place and will carry out all the functions your stomach normally does like acid secretion, digestion, etc. It is know to have better results vs the Lapband with better quality of life. This procedure does not involve altering or re-routing intestines at all like in the gastric bypass, therefore issues of vitamin deficiencies are rarely seen with the gastric sleeve since the stomach will digest the food and the intestine will absorb 100% of the nutrients. It is also a much simpler operation to do vs. the gastric bypass and carries less risk as well. On average, our surgical team take about 35 minutes to complete the procedure. This short OR time is transmitted to the patient as improved safety. With less time in the OR and less time under anesthesia, the percentages of possible complication in the OR are reduced. To learn more about the gastric sleeve or more faq’s please look for my book “Successful Weight loss with the Gastric Sleeve” Also be sure to subscribe to our channel for future videos and updates and send me your comments or questions via twitter or through youtube. I hope you found this video useful. Thanks for watching!