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New Surgery Involves No Incisions, No Stitching

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Sep 9, 2008 4:02 pm US/Mountain

New Surgery Involves No Incisions, No Stitching

DENVER (CBS4) ― Imagine surgery without incisions. No cutting, no stitching -- all the work is done through the patient's mouth. A doctor at one local hospital says it can mean a quicker recovery with fewer complications.

CBS4's Kathy Walsh went to Presbyterian/St. Luke's Medical Center to follow a woman who had a gastric bypass in 1999. It seemed like any other operation. Doctors and staff worked in a sterile environment on a patient who was closely monitored.

"She lost a fair amount of weight but then started to gain some weight back," Dr. Matthew Metz said.

Her stomach had stretched and she came in for a gastric bypass revision; a procedure called Stomaphyx, making the stomach smaller. But in this surgery there was no cutting, no incisions at all; it was all done through her mouth.

"We actually have a sewing machine that we mount on the end of a scope that goes down the mouth and we're able to re-sew the stomach and the connection to the small intestine without making any incisions in the abdomen," Metz said.

Metz says he is the first in the region to offer the operation.

"Doing this through the mouth enables you to do the procedure much faster," Metz said. "The recovery time is much shorter."

Metz said the potential for bleeding and infection with a traditional revision surgery can be as high as 60 percent. Through the mouth it's just 3 percent. With another incision, a patient can spend 5 days or longer in the hospital, according to Metz.

The woman went home the same day, ready to get back on track managing her weight.

The Stomaphyx device was approved by the Food and Drop Administration in 2007.

(© MMX CBS Television Stations, Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)

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