I went to the seminar today and had my heart set on the sleeve. The surgeons in this area offer all 4 surgeries... DS, RNY, sleeve gastrectomy and band, but it seemed like they gave more info on the DS and RNY. I'm confused as to why it seems like they push those two options. I did not want to go that route.

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A lot of WLS studies showed the highest effective weight loss was with RnY and DS. With VSG as sort of the newest WLS option, I imagine that practice i.e. pushing RnY and DS is what your surgeon has always done.

I didn't even think twice about anything that involved malabsorption...not for a few extra pounds lost. I am thrilled with my sleeve results. I am healthy again...that was my goal!

I agree with Sassygirl. My surgeon would have had to do some crazy amounts of convincing to get me to even look briefly at RnY or DS - I had done a bunch of research before I ever started seeking surgeons.

Luckily, my surgeon was right with me. As he rightly pointed out, if I really needed to, I could convert to one of the other malabsorptive surgeries later, but I couldn't go back to try a sleeve if the malabsorption issues got to me. A lot of people with type II diabetes are very successful in reducing or eliminating the diabetes symptoms with the sleeve, so while the more drastic surgeries are even more effective by the percentages, the difference in success rate wasn't enough for me to take the risks of the more drastic surgeries as my starting point.

I'm pretty dead set on the sleeve. I don't see a reason to reroute intestions and deal with all the malabsorption issues if it is not needed. If I was starting at 500-600 lbs then yea definitely I could see the benefit. He also mentioned that the DS is a two part procedure for the super obese (BMI 63+) and the sleeve is the first part of the surgery. They get their BMI lower so the complication risk goes down, then they have another surgery to convert to the DS. He said that over 50% were so successful with just the sleeve portion that they never came back for the second operation. That is pretty encouraging knowing that someone with a BMI 20+ above mine can be so successful with "just" the sleeve.

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If you go with the sleeve, I would ask how many your doctor has done. Mine only does the sleeve or bypass. He'll do the bypass for those who are super obese or have really bad GERD. To me the sleeve just seemed to make the most sense and I'm soooo happy I did it!

The sleeve is the first part of the DS. Some people only lose 15 or so BMI points with the VS, but can then be converted to the DS. You don't have to choose the DS straight away.