Is pneumatic balloon dilation safe and effective primary modality of treatment for post-sleeve gastrectomy strictures? A retrospective study

BACKGROUND: The optimal treatment of sleeve strictures has not been agreed upon at the current time. At our institution, we began using pneumatic balloon dilation to help resolve these obstructions in 2010. Herein we report our experience with pneumatic balloon dilation for the treatment of sleeve strictures. METHODS: From Jan 2010 to Dec 2016 we retrospectively reviewed our prospectively kept database for patients who developed a Laparoscopic Sleeve Gastrectomy (LSG) stricture within 90 days of surgery. If the stricture was found, then we dilated all our patients initially at 30 mm at 10 PSI for 10-20 min (14.5 min average) and increased the balloon size (30-40 mm) and duration (10-30 min) in subsequent sessions if the first session was unsuccessful. RESULTS: The review found that 1756 patients underwent either LSG or the first step of a Laparoscopic Duodenal Switch (LDS) (1409 LSG & 356 LDS). Of the 1756 patient 33 patients (24 underwent LSG, and 9 underwent LDS) developed a stricture as a complication of LSG. The average age of the patients was 46.4 (±9.6) years, and the average BMI was 43.7 (±6.4). The most common location for stricture was mid-body of the sleeve (54.5%). The average time from the primary surgery to diagnosis and first pneumatic dilation was 5.6 months (± 6.8) and 5.9 months (± 6.6) respectively. We successfully used pneumatic dilation in 31 (93.9%) of these patients to relieve the stricture. CONCLUSION: We conclude that pneumatic dilation is an effective procedure in patients with post sleeve gastrectomy stricture.