CNN.com had a write up on the pros & cons of RNY vs the band this morning:

http://www.cnn.com/2006/HEALTH/conditions/01/02/obesity.surgery.ap/index.html

Cool article. thanks for the link!

There's also a great article in today's New York Times about the growing prevalence of surgical weight loss in Europe. The "vast majority" of weight-loss surgeries involve the band, it said, though it was also about the growing popularity of the gastric balloon.

It was a surprisingly supportive piece, and I'm hoping there will be more like this in the future. I kept waiting for the other shoe to drop, something about how unsuccessful the US trials were and that this procedure isn't good enough for us rich Americans, but it didn't take that tone at all.

In some early trials in the United States, he added, the less invasive techniques produced mixed results, and this lastingly tarnished their reputation among American medical professionals.

...

Weight-loss experts on both sides of the Atlantic are somewhat mystified about why early trials of banding and balloons were not as successful in the United States as in Europe. Eating habits may be partly to blame, however, as patients must be capable of cutting down on food to benefit fully from the simpler European procedures.

Although the procedures reduce the stomach to the size of a coffee cup, they will "not be effective if it is filled hundreds of times a day," Dr. Basso said.

I like that last point. Very well said!

Here's the link.

We had a large section in the Dallas newpaper too!