Hi, I am asked this question do much by my friends and family. Is there anyone on this forum that has had their sleeve very long? If not are you aware of any long term studies? I know this has not been done very long in the U.S. but what about in other parts of the world? I'm just curious on the long term effects and what is my life going to be like 10-20 years from now? Thanks!

according to this link: http://www.obesityhelp.com/forums/vsg/about_vertical_sleeve_gastrectomy.html Sleeve was first done in in 1996 and was first offered in the U.S. in 2001.

http://www.weightlosstriumph.com/long-term-effect-of-sleeve-gastrectomy-on-weight-loss-and-ghrelin.html http://www.obesityhelp.com/group/VSGM/discussion/4320012/Long-term-results-of-laparoscopic-sleeve-gastrectomy-for/

The sleeve procedure was started as the first step to a gastric revision, from what I understand. It was developed for patients who were too big to undergo a RNY or other procedure safely. The sleeve allowed them to lose weight and then to undergo a second procedure to finalize the weight loss surgery at a later date. They found that people were losing decent weight on it and so eventually it became its own form of surgery.

If I remember correctly, the first sleeves were larger than the ones we're given because it was a staged procedure. I think I recall my doctor saying that the sleeve as a stand alone procedure is relatively recent, so there isn't as much data on the long term effects of sleeving versus other types of weight loss surgery, though the data indicates that the results of a sleeve are on par with the results you'd get from the much more risky RNY procedure.

To my knowledge there's not 20 years worth of data on the effects of sleeving. We're really all guinea pigs of a sort

I am one of the longer sleeved ones here, but only about 3 1/2 years.

Thing is, in 1976 my mom had a horrible bleeding ulcer. It was so bad, she ended up having over half of her stomach removed. Essentially, very similar to today's sleeve. At the time, she was 102 pounds overweight. She lost all of that within about two years of her surgery. To this day, her and I both are only able to eat small amounts of food. She has never had any adverse effects and remains at a healthy weight.

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Thing is, in 1976 my mom had a horrible bleeding ulcer. It was so bad, she ended up having over half of her stomach removed. Essentially, very similar to today's sleeve. At the time, she was 102 pounds overweight. She lost all of that within about two years of her surgery. To this day, her and I both are only able to eat small amounts of food. She has never had any adverse effects and remains at a healthy weight.

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My mother told me that my grandfather had had that procedure for ulcers and had lived for over 40 years after the surgery, when he did die it was from lung cancer so probably not related to the surgery. He died when I was a teenager which is over 20 years ago so you could deduce from this that a variation of the sleeve even though for a different reason has been around for at least 60 years. Also what I remember of my grandfather he was very skinny and ate very small amounts but ate at least 5 times a day.

Thanks everyone for this info. I appreciate you taking the time to explain to me your knowledge on this subject. It's very helpful.

my mother also bad ulcers when i was a child....circa 1970 's.....2months before tagament was cleared by fda. the surgeons didn't do her any favors they removed parts of stomach shouldn't have. that 35years ago and just celebrated her 68th