Page 9 - Valley Life & Health

THE MORNING CALL SATURDAY, MAY 25, 2019 9

program is important. Like any other specialty, the Those successful patients also discover a
job of Easton Hospital’s bariatric doctors is to make newfound confidence and a world opens up to
the patient healthy – and helping them lose weight them that they may have thought was lost.
surgically is only one of the modalities that they use. “I have a patient who used to sing
There is also the issue of how the patient’s professionally onstage. I never knew that until she
mental health plays a role in their weight loss was halfway through the program. Some people
journey. Patients must be emotionally prepared to don’t like to share many details about their lives
go through the process and commit to remaining until they’re comfortable with their physician,”
in the system even if they choose not to have shares Dr. Singhal. “She started telling me how
surgery or are not a candidate for surgery. To that she used to sing and she didn’t want to be onstage
end, there are support groups that patients are because she was so conscious of her weight. She Hospital
encouraged to attend to share their experience had surgery and started losing weight, and you
with others who have taken the same path. can see the change in her demeanor. The back
“We make sure that they have full access to straightens up and the shoulders straighten up. Easton
a dietician and an exercise physiologist who, on She is about three years post-surgery, and now of
a day-to – day basis, can advise them and keep she’s back onstage singing again.” courtesy
them on track,” says Dr. Singhal. “The emotional
and social aspect gets taken care of more in a Lehigh Valley Weight Loss Photo
program like ours.” Thousands of people across the Lehigh Valley
Once patients are enrolled in the program, have already discovered Lehigh Valley Weight Artun Aksade, MD
they see Dr. Singhal or Dr. Aksade every couple Loss, which is the largest medical and surgical
of months. In the meantime, they have the weight loss program in the area. Still, it might be
opportunity to attend classes at the hospital safe to say that for many others, it’s the area’s “That is true for all surgical weight loss. The
that teach them everything from how to count best-kept healthcare secret. risk of heart attack, stroke, diabetes and the long-
calories to how to decipher food labels and what John Scaffidi, MD, FABOM, FACOG and term downstream of those are a thousand times
healthier foods they can shop for. They are also Maneesh Ailawadi, MD, FSSO were the first to more risky than the small risk of [weight loss]
taught how to prepare healthier meals. With perform outpatient bariatric surgery in the state, surgery,” confirms Dr. Ailawadi. “We want to
any questions that arise, they have a member of and have realized the importance of becoming make sure their heart is in good shape, their lungs
the bariatric team ready to help them remain what they call the “primary caregiver” for are in good shape, and that they have no blood
committed to their goals. patients’ weight loss journeys. Scaffidi, who has clotting disorders. That’s the standard procedure
Program success, says Dr. Singhal, is three decades of experience in obstetrics and we go through for any operation. We go through
measured by the time and effort the patient is gynecology, consistently saw patients come into that checklist and we make the operation as safe
willing to put in. his practice who either didn’t qualify for weight as possible by making sure of that.”
“The successful patient is somebody who is loss surgery, or didn’t want it. The goal for him While there are multiple types of weight
never missing classes, somebody who is always became providing his patients with a way to get loss surgery, that one that they use most often
making it to their appointments even during bad the medical component of weight loss taken care is the laparoscopic sleeve (LGS) procedure,
weather, somebody who calls to reschedule to of before surgery could even be an option. which is the most popular and safest form of
make it to an afternoon or evening appointment Enter Dr. Ailawadi, who had opened his own bariatric surgery. It is done by making several
because they missed the morning appointment. private practice performing bariatric surgery, small incisions in the abdomen, having a surgical
Those are the people I see doing better. general surgery, and surgical oncology. Four years camera (laparoscope) and special surgical tools
Commitment doesn’t come in one fell swoop – it’s ago, the two physicians began working together inserted through them, and then having a portion
those little things which incrementally add up that to provide a truly unique full-service center that of the stomach cut away to limit the amount of
really makes it work.” presents patients with a multidisciplinary approach food that can fit in it. The new, banana-like shape
to weight loss. Their collaborative effort also goes from the esophagus to the small intestines.
brings patients into the fold of Easton’s weight loss The operation takes about 45 minutes to an hour,
program for the surgical component. and patients go home the next day. The program has
“It kind of came around a little backward less than a one percent readmission rate.
from the way that most programs are built up. “With the post-op phase, we switch our gears
The hospital provides the bariatric surgery, but a little bit on the medical division because we want
I created the program in the beginning because to make sure that nutritionally, the patient is getting
it was for people who didn’t want the surgery adequate vitamins and minerals as well as overall
or didn’t qualify,” explains Dr. Scaffidi. “It then nutrition – and that weight loss is neither too rapid
became so busy that I started to have one or two nor too little,” explains Dr. Scaffidi. “And this is
percent of people who needed surgery or wanted really where the art of medicine comes in. Each
Hospital it. Then it was five or six percent, and pretty soon patient is going to be treated differently. We just go
hand in hand with the patient through the rest of
I had patients asking me daily, ‘Where can I go?’ I
knew of Dr. Ailawadi’s expertise, and together we
that post-op phase, which is usually a longer phase.
Easton put the two services together.” Our medical team never lets go of that patient.”
The two used the paradigm of the
About 90 percent of the patients continue on
of multidisciplinary approaches to other areas of in the program and show amazing success.
courtesy medicine – such as cancer care and cardiac care Scaffidi. “There hasn’t been anybody we’ve seen
“We haven’t been stumped yet,” says Dr.
teams – and applied it to weight loss. The most
Photo important issue became that the impact of not where we can say, ‘I don’t know what to do for
Vinay Singhal, MD, Medical Director of treating obesity far outweighed the risks of you because you’re not losing weight. That just
hasn’t happened.”
treating it.
Bariatric Surgery at Easton Hospital