Europe's first incisionless procedure for stomach reduction
23 Sept 2010
UK surgeons have performed the first procedure in Europe using
USGI's Incisionless Operating Platform to reduce stomach size of obese
patients.
The scar-free procedure is designed to reduce the size of the
stomach to help patients feel full after consuming less food.
Surgeons Mr. James Byrne and Mr. Jamie Kelly performed Europe's
first POSE procedures on six patients at a private hospital in
Southampton last month The patients who underwent the procedure
returned to work or normal activities within 2-3 days.
"Given the lack of long-term success patients experience with
diets and weight loss drugs, we're very proud to be the first in
Europe to offer this incisionless procedure to help overweight and
obese patients feel full and eat less," Mr. Jamie Kelly said.
This discreet outpatient procedure should result in less pain,
shorter hospitalisation, less risk of infection and no visible scars
compared to traditional surgeries performed through the abdomen. Our
first patients were back at their jobs without any bandages or signs
of surgery within two to three days."
None of the patients experienced any complications other than a
slight sore throat. To perform the POSE (Primary Obesity Surgery,
Endolumenal) surgery, surgeons pass the USGI IOP down a patient's
throat, and use tools to grasp tissue and deploy the company's
specially-designed expandable tissue anchors to create multiple
tissue folds around the stomach. An endoscope provides
visualization.
Another Southampton surgeon Mr. Michael Van den Bossche recently
used the IOP and similar techniques to perform ROSE (Repair of
Surgery, Endolumenal) in patients who started to regain weight
because their stomach pouches and stomas had stretched out since a
previous bariatric surgery. Mr.Van den Bossche will also be
performing POSE procedures.
"We are proud to be working with leading edge surgeons in Europe
to offer Incisionless Surgery to their patients and to pioneer this
exciting field," USGI Medical President and Chief Executive Mr.
Eugene Chen said. "We look forward to expanding Incisionless Surgery
across Europe with our distribution partners. We are on track to
have distribution relationships in place in all of the major
European markets by 2011."
The devices that make up the IOP received the European CE Mark in
March 2010.