Gastric Banding Research Today is a free monthly online journal that collates and summarizes the latest research about Gastric Banding, including details on laparoscopic gastric banding, stomach stapling, gastric bypass, risks, diet.

Tachyarrhythmia due to atrial fibrillation in an intragastric balloon carrier: coincidence or consequence?

Puglisi F, Capuano P, Veneziani N, Lobascio P, Di Franco AD, Lograno G, Iambrenghi OC

DETO, Section of General Surgery and Trapianto di Fegato, University of Bari, Italy. g.bros@tiscali.it

A morbidly obese patient is reported who underwent insertion of a BioEnterics Intragastric Balloon (BIB) as a pre-surgical procedure (ie. prior to restrictive gastric banding). While carrying the BIB, the patient suffered an episode of severe supraventricular tachyarrhythmia (atrial fibrillation). Although such an event is not definitely correlated to the BIB, the episode led us to modify the pre-treatment protocol, introducing dynamic Holter ECG into the work-up investigations and excluding subjects with a pathological cardiac rhythm.

Published 10 June 2005 in Obes Surg, 15(5): 716-8.
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