Let's make one thing clear up front: weight loss surgery isn't a permanent solution to your weight loss problem. In fact, it's an extreme measure to help reduce your weight and should only be considered if all the positives outweigh the negatives. Usually it is only considered for people who are obese and have little chance of reducing their weight quickly enough using conventional methods, if your BMI is registering in the overweight column then a surgeon is unlikely to allow you to go under their knife.

Weight loss surgery involves either restricting the size of the stomach with surgical staples or affecting the way your body absorbs food (known as malabsorptive surgery). Recently doctors have been using a combination of both methods to try and give the patient every chance possible to reduce their weight and keep it off.

Restrictive weight loss surgery works on the idea that if your brain tells you that your stomach is full earlier then you will eat less. Using surgical staples or an adjustable band the surgeon will reduce the size of your stomach to about the size of a large egg. This literally forces you to eat less as you won't be able to fit any more food in to your stomach – infact after several mouthfuls you will begin to feel full.

Malabsorptive surgery is much more complex and targets the way your body takes in the calories from your food. The first option is to bypass a large part of your small intestines so that you have less chance of absorbing the food and you will excrete more unprocessed waste. Another option is to alter how and when the digestive acids are mixed with your food. The digestive acids like bile and pancreatic juices help break down the food so that they can be absorbed more easily. Usually this occurs near the stomach, but if they are introduced towards the middle or end of the small intestines then your body isn't able to process the food as well.

Nowadays many surgeons are electing to do a combination of the methods mentioned above because it increases the chances of the patient being able to reduce and keep off the weight. However, weight loss surgery should only be considered as a last resort and it's not a permanent solution, infact after the initial success many patients report a rise in weight after several years as their eating habits haven't changed. Unless you are fully prepared to change your lifestyle and eating habits, weight loss surgery could end up being a waste of $30,000 and put you through unnecessary discomfort and trauma, so make sure you are mentally and psychologically prepared to change the way you live forever after weight loss surgery.