Michael Dermody of Cosmetic Bliss - specialist provider of Weight Loss Surgery examines the reasons why some patients who undergo surgery are unable to maintain weight loss after the procedure, and offers some possible solutions.

After all else has failed over years - all the various diets, fitness and exercise plans, all the various weight loss regimes and appetite suppressing or “fat busting� drugs, Bariatric Surgery is seen the last chance to lose weight permanently by those suffering from Morbid Obesity. Rightly so! It isn’t a soft option or a quick fix, and many patients only reach the conclusion that surgery is the sole option left to them after months - often years - of pondering on it.

Cosmetic Bliss have announced that they are now able to offer patients the Heliosphere Air-Filled Intragastric Balloon weight loss programme at their partner hospital Nemocnice Breclav in the Czech Republic. The cost - fully inclusive of flights, accommodation, transport, procedure - including removal of the Balloon after 6 months - AND a 2 year support package is only £3,400 (3,990 euro)
The procedure, which is performed by an endoscopic specialist (no surgical incisions required!) is a very useful addition to the range of Bariatric procedures (Gastric Banding & Sleeve Gastrectomy) the company provides. All weight loss patients are under the care of Dr Michal Cierny PhD – the renowned Bariatric Surgeon who performs all Cosmetic Bliss Obesity surgery, but this procedure will be carried out by Dr Martin Kriz, the Hospital’s Chief Surgeon and specialist endoscopist, and Dr Otto Riebel, the senior endoscopist.
Michael Dermody of Cosmetic Bliss said:
“The Gastric Balloon, which is put into the stomach for 6 months and allows patients to eat much less, thereby reducing food volume and calorie intake, is a very useful and proven medical Weight Loss procedure. It is ideal for those patients who are either just that bit too small for surgery such as a Lap Band or a Sleeve Gastrectomy, but still find it impossible to sustain weight loss by other methods. Also it can be useful if a patient has a medical condition which would not allow them to have surgery, or if their BMI is so high that surgery would be unsafe without first losing some weight.
We offered the saline filled BIB Balloon to patients for several years, but found that it was hard for some of them to tolerate it inside their stomachs. It took a lot to get used to – weighing more than half a Kilo when inflated! This new air-filled balloon, being double skinned and coated with pure gold on the inside (to prevent air molecules from escaping and causing the balloon to deflate) is more expensive, but because it weighs only 30g, patients find it much easier to get used to.
We tell everyone who comes to us for weight loss that NO procedure is a magic wand, and if they are to be successful they must change their diet and eating habits. The real secret is taking full advantage of the support we offer before and after the procedure. This is especially the case with the Balloon. It comes out after 6 months, and our patients must use the time it is inside to re-educate themselves and keep up the eating habits, portion control and increased exercise activity they have learnt. That’s why we have an extended 2 year support programme with nutrition, diet exercise and behaviour modification advice for Balloon patients – this is absolutely vital to make sure they get the most from it�
For more information visit http://www.cosmeticbliss.co.uk/p/weight-loss-surgery/gastric-balloon

On 1st November 2009 Cosmetic Bliss and Dr Michal Cierny PhD (Bariatric Surgeon) moved from the BMI Clinic in Brno where they had worked for over two years performing Gastric Band operations and Sleeve Gastrectomies, to Breclav Hospital near Brno.
The move was carried out to enable Dr Cierny to create a European Centre of Excellence in Bariatric Surgery. Dr Cierny plans to develop and extend his activities in the field of Bariatric Surgery by offering a wider range of procedures for Czech patients and also for patients from English-speaking countries who are brought to him and cared for by Cosmetic Bliss. The new centre, The Bariatric and Metabolic Centre, Breclav Hospital will fully integrate the disciplines of the dietitians, diabetologists, internal medicine specialists, anaesthetists and surgeon, and the comprehensive resuscitation, cardiac and ICU facilities of this large and well equipped hospital enable those patients with serious health problems to safely undergo surgery. Breclav Hospital is currently the only hospital in Europe to hold certificates for international standards ISO 9001. ISO 13001 and OHSAS 18001.
Dr Cierny said “I am more than ever convinced that it is vital to have a complete multi-disciplinary approach to the problems of obesity. Surgery is shown to be the long-term solution to morbid obesity, but surgery is only truly effective when the patients can receive the support and continuing encouragement and guidance of other professionals in the journey through their weight loss after their surgical procedure.”
Michael Dermody, one of the directors of Cosmetic Bliss, the UK company that arranges for English-speaking patients from UK, Eire and the USA to come for Weight Loss Surgery to Dr Cierny and Breclav Hospital welcomed this move, and suppported Dr Cierny’s comments. He added “I believe that psychological preparation for surgery, whether it is Banding, a Sleeve Gastrectomy, a Gastric Bypass or even a non-surgical intervention such as a stomach balloon is the most important factor in enabling the outcome of the procedure to be successful. I became even more aware of this during my own journey through weight loss after Dr Cierny performed a Sleeve Gastrectomy on me in September 2008. I have seen many cases of patients - both through the NHS and privately in the UK - going through weight loss surgery with inadequate preparation and information beforehand and little follow-up or counselling afterwards to enable them to understand the emotional changes and the changes in their relationship with food that weight loss after surgery brings about. We invest a great deal of our time and resources to ensure our patients are fully prepared for their procedure, and do our utmost to create a network of support, in terms of diet, nutrition and psychological assistance which our patients can call on in the months and years after their surgery. We really encourage our patients to maintain regular contact with us and with fellow patients. Quite honestly, Weight Loss Surgery is not a cheap nor an easy option, and it is wrong that people should make such a major investment, emotionally and financially, only to be left to fail because of inadequate preparation or poor support and follow up. In the UK, NICE (the National Institute for Clinical Excellence) has embraced the IFSO (International Federation of Surgeons in Obesity) criteria for acceptance of patients for surgical weight loss treatment, and part of those criteria involve careful psychological evaluation to ensure the patient is well placed to benefit from surgery. I know many UK PCTs set much tougher standards in terms of arbitrarily imposing higher BMI requirements on local candidates for surgery and this is clearly an attempt to limit the costs to the NHS of surgical procedures, but I believe they would be much better advised to concentrate on providing adequate support and counselling for those morbidly obese candidates for surgery they are able to afford to treat; in the long run this would prove a much more cost-effective option in terms of successful weight loss and the reduction of NHS costs in dealing with some of the co-morbidities associated with obesity such as Type II Diabetes and Hypertension”
Cosmetic Bliss is well placed to accept new patients for surgery with Dr Cierny in Breclav Hospital because of the new unit, though there is a waiting list of approximately 1 month.

Following a BBC 10-o’clock news item on Thursday 9th October on the dangers of having Gastric Banding in Belgium, Cosmetic Bliss, who, of course, co-operate exclusively with Dr Michal Cierny PhD in Brno, Czech Republic for all bariatric surgery felt the need to respond.
Cosmetic Bliss hold no brief for Belgian Weight Loss Surgeons, and strongly support IFSO guidelines on appropriate BMI levels being used as a factor in risk assessment of patient suitability for surgery. All surgery performed under general anaesthesia carries a risk however, and the laparoscopic techniques used in Gastric Banding and Sleeve Gastrectomies, although proven to have several advantages over open surgery, are not risk-free. Nevertheless, under the care of an experienced specialist surgeon such as Dr Cierny, and with the support of a good surgical team the risks of surgery for a patient are much smaller than the risks involved in remaining obese. It is the duty of the surgeon and his team to make an assessment of a patient’s
suitability for surgery on the basis of this risk assessment.

In a normal city you would expect a special bus line that goes from the international airport to the city center. Not everybody can afford a cab, and not everybody likes cabs as such.

In Brno, the airport is served by regular bus line number 76 that has about ten stops on the way to the center and thus is used also by people from the neighborhood the bus goes through. And it is also used by people who work in the industrial zone that neighbors the airport.

Result?

Brits spending £161m a year on medical tourism
Last year over 50,000 Britons traveled abroad for low cost medical treatment, with trips for cosmetic surgery and dentistry among the most popular. A rapidly growing number of UK residents are now combining a few weeks in the sun with surgery for popular procedures such as breast augmentation, liposuction, tummy-tucks and teeth whitening.

Huge savings can be made by going abroad for treatment and this growing trend for medical tourism is set to soar with many people choosing to travel to exotic places as far a field as Malaysia and India with locations like Spain, Cyprus and Belgium among the most popular among British medical tourists.

By CTK / Published 20 August 2007
Prague, Aug 18 (CTK) - Czech plastic surgeon Bohdan Pomahac from Olomouc, north Moravia, has become head of a U.S. team that will become the third one in the world to transplant faces, Mlada fronta Dnes (MfD) writes today.

Another such workplace is only in France. It transplanted the face of a woman whom a dog bit out a cheek, the lips and the nose.

“The third clinic is in China but the doctors have not released any detailed data on the operations, so it is difficult to say how successful they are,” Pohamac, 36, told the paper.

By Bernard Purcell - Irish Independent - Thursday July 26 2007
AIRLINES and airports will be banned from charging for assisting disabled and elderly passengers under new EU rules. Airlines, airports and travel agents will now be obliged to ensure that would-be travellers with reduced mobility are afforded the same levels of access as the able-bodied. The airlines and airports now have a change-over period of a year until the new rules can be enforced.

By CTK / Published 31 July 2007 Prague, July 30 (CTK)

Most Czechs in favour of smoking ban in restaurants
- The number of Czechs who mind smoking in restaurants, bars and cafes is rising and over half of the population would like to ban smoking at such places completely, a poll conducted by the Median agency for the daily Mlada fronta Dnes (MfD) has revealed.

The results differ considerably from another poll made by the Eurobarometer agency half a year ago. Only one third of Czechs were in favour of non-smoking restaurants then,MfD writes today.

By Ilya Marritz - Czech radio 23/1/07