Overweight and obesity are today's major nutritional problems in the industrialized countries. They are far more common than all the other nutritional problems combined, but there is no satisfactory definition for this disease and there is no single ratio of increased weight to height, or a determined body mass index (BMI) at which we can say that the associated diseases begin that will limit and shorten life.

A practical definition is "the excessive accumulation of body fat" but even this simple "excess" is very subjective from patient to patient. Recent studies report that 80% of the American population is suffering a degree of overweight or obesity. Contributing factors are still subject to discussion. Some are very clear but others are usually consequences rather than causes. For example, the influence of psychological factors remains obscure. While the obese have been tagged as compulsive eaters or "overeaters" when emotionally upset, so are many non-obese persons. Psychopathology may be linked to this disease in only a small number of people. Some of these suffer from "night eating syndrome" (morning anorexia, evening gluttony and insomnia). Other literature includes in this small group those who have been obese since childhood, which in this case, is more than a psychological factor. Common sense would call it a psychological consequence.

Family factors are interesting. 80% of the offspring of 2 obese parents are obese, compared with 40% of 1 obese parent, and only 10% of non-obese parents. Some authors refer to this factor as "genetics." Also controversial, the translation of this statistic is "slim parents may raise obese children and obese parents may raise slim children." Obesity may not be genetically inherited, but it is a fact that siblings learn bad habits from parents, and many children are eating adult size meals. Who knows? Maybe obesity starts with a mother or father who derives pleasure from watching the family eat.

Regarding social factors, some studies mention that obesity is 6 times more prevalent among low-income people, but the bottom line is that people gain weight because of the chronic intake of either "non-expensive calories" or "expensive calories."

Even food habits are confusing. While some obese people eat large amounts of food all day long and others do not, some are affected because of the quantity of their food and the others because of the quality. Many slim people also spend the day eating between meals, but people differ in the efficiency with which they use and store energy (in the form of adipose tissue).

Here is one factor not yet found in the literature: Maybe the most common trigger of adult-onset obesity seen at medical offices for weight control purposes is a lifestyle change. Many people start gaining weight after marriage, once graduated and working full time, or after childbirth. All of these involve either an increase in caloric intake or a decrease in caloric expenditure.

In conclusion, obesity will result from chronic caloric excess relative to the caloric expenditure, regardless of age, class, sex, and ethnicity.

The prevalence of obesity doubles between the ages of 20 and 50, and drastically drops in the elderly. The reason: lethal complications, often in combination, that will end the person’s life, commonly during their fifties.

People who are overweight or obese have been the subject of jokes, laughter, and sometimes discrimination. They have been considered responsible for their condition, while the truth is that they have been victims of a disease that affects not only the physical aspects of life, but also the behavioral and emotional. This disease is now considered to be a life-threatening, progressive, and chronic disease of epidemic proportions.

More than 200,000 of people around the world are enjoying a healthier weight, thanks to the implementation of the adjustable gastric band system surgery for weight loss. The adjustable gastric band is an implant, designed to modify the somach capacity with out harming the digestive tissue, no staples or incissions on stomach and small intestine that interfere with the normal digestive process and negatively affects micronutrient absorption. More benefits of the abjustable gastric band system over other surgical procedures to induce weight loss are: totally reversible procedure, no large incissions on abdominal wall and one day recovery on surgical center.

Adjustable gastric band system is a world known and accepted surgical procedure to induce weigth loss, since the band is placed around the stomach with laparoscopic techniques, it is considered a minimally invasive surgery.

Success rate for weight loss in patients who try with diets is 4% in a 3 year period, compared to 85% of patients who chose the adjustable gastric band system as the tool for weigth loss combined with a balanced diet. In our experience, patients who follow intstructions 100%, will be 100% succesful on weigth loss.