A healthy gastric band diet following New Jersey REALIZE band surgery recommended by gastric bypass surgeon.
New York, NY (1888PressRelease) July 01, 2008 - To recognize when it’s time to adjust a gastric band – REALIZE or Lap Band - you need to understand how gastric band surgery helps you lose weight. In short, gastric band surgery works by restricting you from eating large portions of food at a time. The REALIZE and Lap Bands only work on the amount of food you intake; they do not have sensors to prevent you from eating high calorie or unhealthy foods such as ice cream or fast foods. It also does not prevent you from ingesting liquid calories - soda, juices, vitamin water, etc., which slip through the band’s restriction around the top of the stomach with ease. Lastly, eating multiple meals per day, or grazing, will hamper weight loss as the total calorie count per day will go up with multiple meals. It’s key for gastric band patients – REALIZE or Lap Band - to aim for three meals per day with 30 minutes spent on each meal.
During the first year after surgery, you will require approximately three to five REALZIE or Lap Band adjustments to achieve your goal weight. The band adjustments are done either in your surgeon’s office or under fluoroscopy (X-ray) at hospital or surgery center. There is no right or wrong way to perform band adjustments. At the New Jersey Bariatric Center, we routinely perform band adjustments (more than 99%) in the office. There is no need for local anesthesia with adjustments, they usually take five to 10 minutes, and are less painful than getting blood drawn.
On average, the goal is to lose one to two pounds per week after REALIZE or Lap Band surgery. Band adjustments are performed approximately every four to six weeks when one is either no longer able to achieve a one to two pound weight loss per week while eating healthy or feels hungry between meals to the point that it’s distracting you from normal daily activity. The key is finding the level of restriction that decreases your food intake without making you uncomfortable or hungry all the time. It’s important to be patient with yourself in the beginning, you will be getting use to a new way of eating and may face the inability to tolerate certain hard foods that you use to eat prior to surgery.
I hear different gastric band myths from patients all the time. Some of the most common to consider prior to band adjustment include:
1.The tighter the band, the faster the weight loss. When the band is too tight it often leads to cheating. When it’s so tight that you’re at the point where you can’t tolerate solid foods, you will often compensate by eating high-calorie liquid calories [soda, juices] or soft foods [ice cream]. In this scenario, you may have a tighter band, but you can actually gain weight. Another way to cheat is to graze, eating smaller meals all day long. This can backfire too by increasing an individual’s calorie intake. And finally, patients whose bands are too tight often will “lubricate” it with sauces and creams to get the food through the opening, once again increasing the calorie intake and gaining weight, instead of losing it.
2.The more adjustments one gets, the faster the weight loss. Making to frequent adjustments will only lead to a very tight band, leaving you unsatisfied, which often leads to cheating.
3.You can lose the same amount of weight per week as one does with gastric bypass surgery. Gastric bypass surgery restricts your food intake like gastric band surgery, however it also involves malabsorption of food which increases weight loss. Therefore, you will not lose weight at the same rate as a gastric bypass patient.
If you feel off track and aren’t happy with your weight loss, I suggest you participate in a small one to two week calorie count assignment to help determine why you’re not losing the weight. The assignment starts by recording everything you eat daily in order to calculate the total calories taken in each day. Two sites I recommend to help with the calculations are www.FitDay.com or www.thecaloriecounter.com. I find that patients who aren’t happy with their weight loss, tend to take in more calories per day then they realize, particularly the liquid calories which I mentioned earlier that can slip through the band quite easily, but also eating multiple meals a day and continuing to eat fast food can put you off course. Charting your calorie intake will help you determine if you fall in this category. Remember, to lose weight with the band, you need to take in no more than 1200 calories per day and perform cardio exercise at least 30min three times per week to be successful. Some additional tips to maximizing weight loss include weighing yourself on a weekly basis, regular monthly appointments with your bariatric surgeon to evaluate progress and regular calorie counting to keep you on track.
New Jersey Bariatric Center
The New Jersey Bariatric Center, led by Dr. Ajay Goyal, has offices in Union and Hoboken, New Jersey. Dr. Goyal’s approach to patient care has resulted in zero mortality to date and a complication rate that is lower than the national average. These surgical results stand out as some of the best in New Jersey. If you or someone you love is considering bariatric surgery – gastric bypass, REALIZE band or lap band procedure - please join us for one of our free educational seminars. To register, visit us at www.njbaritriccenter.com.
New Jersey Bariatric Center
700 Rahway Avenue
Union, NJ 07083
(908) 378-1779
http://www.njbariatriccenter.com/pages/new-jersey-lap-band-surgery.html
A healthy gastric band diet following New Jersey REALIZE band surgery recommended by gastric bypass surgeon. 
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