Laparoscopic Roux-en-Y Gastric Bypass After Gastroesophageal Reflux Disease Surgical Procedure: Analysis of 85 Consecutive Patients with Pre- and Post-Operative Endoscopy Control.

Background

Most of the obese patients undergoing an anti-reflux operation experience recurrence of gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD). Laparoscopic Roux-en-Y gastric bypass (LRNYGB) has been accepted as the bariatric surgery of choice for a previous GERD-operated obese patients.

Methods

We present 85 consecutive patients from a single institution, previously submitted to antireflux surgery and then to LRNYGB. Preoperative endoscopy was carried out in all patients; 49 (57.64%) patients had findings of fundoplication failure or signs of persistent GERD, of those 20 (40.81%) with esophagitis.

Results

From the bypass, per or postoperative minor to moderate complications occurred in 12 patients (14.11%): 2 (2.35%) conversions to laparotomy, 1 (1.17%) melena, 8 (9.41%) stenosis of gastrojejunostomy, treated by a simple endoscopic dilatation with a balloon, and 1 (1.17%) gastrogastric fistula. A follow-up endoscopy of 79 of 85 (92.9%) patients was carried out after 6 months of LRNYGB. Eight of 79 (10.12%) patients had persistent esophagitis that represented 40% (8 of 20 patients) of persistent reflux esophagitis even after LRNYGB. All of them were men.

Conclusion

LRNYGB after laparoscopic fundoplication is a feasible procedure with an excepted higher rate of complications because of the complexity of the procedure. Nevertheless esophagitis still persisted in many of those patients.