Doctors carry out first weight loss surgery successfully

Surgeons at Kenyatta National Hospital have successfully carried out the first bariatric surgery on a 66-year-old man, who weighed 175kg.

Led by Dr Kennedy Ondede, the team of surgeons, doctors and nurses worked to ensure that by the end of the one-and-a-half hour operation, John Muthama had lost 10 kilos.

Mr Muthama’s wife, Agnes Waithaka, had all along known that her husband’s weight gain was as a result of her good cooking. Little did she know that it would lead her husband into the surgery ward.

“When my husband started gaining weight I knew it was because of my food and people would praise me for the good work but when he could not walk, I sensed danger,” says Mrs Waithaka. They had to employ a helper who would walk him around every day.

“It got worse until the day he developed hypertension and was losing breath, that’s when I knew we had to rush him to the hospital,” she says.

Mr Muthama’s weight had been increasing gradually over 10 years with his efforts to find a solution for the problem bearing no fruit.

“I had done all I could to reduce his weight but instead it was increasing. I did dieting, exercises but all was in vain. I had to check myself in for a surgery, which was my last resort,” Mr Muthama said.

He checked into the hospital on May 7 and was handled by five doctors namely a renal specialist, a cardiologist, a nutritionist, a neurologist and a psychiatrist who took time to study their patient before agreeing on how to proceed with the operation. “The surgery was not a big deal; it is a minimal access surgery. Though it is not a one-off thing, we need to follow up with the patient to ensure that he maintains the kind of life that we want. It is known that after three years, if the patient is not followed and goes back to his eating habits, he will gain the weight again,” Dr Ondede said.

At 175 kilos and a Body Mass Index of 59. 5kg/m2, Mr Muthama was diagnosed with class III obesity and having done all other producers and failed, he opted for surgery.

The surgery enables patients to have sustained weight loss and also to normalise blood sugar, blood pressure, cholesterol and resolve joint problems.

The surgeons removed 80 per cent of Mr Muthama’s stomach, leaving a “tube-shaped stomach the size and shape of a banana”. In private facilities, the procedure costs Sh1.5 million, but at KNH, Mr Muthama paid Sh500,000.