Former footballer praises NHS after weight loss surgery (From The Northern Echo)

Former footballer praises NHS after weight loss surgery

8:00am Tuesday 7th February 2012 in NHS & Health News By Barry Nelson, Health Editor

A FORMER footballer turned businessman has praised the NHS after he became the first patient to have weight loss surgery at a North-East hospital.

In his mid-teens, Simon Brown was a skinny, lanky centre-forward who was a trialist at Scottish clubs Motherwell and St Mirren.

Later in life, he gained a masters degree from Teesside University and set up several property businesses.

But when those businesses began to struggle, he started to pile on the weight.

Eventually, Mr Brown, 36, weighed 25st, which had a range of serious effects on his health, from a sleeping disorder to arthritis.

“I was in agony trying to move around,” said Mr Brown, who is married to Victoria and has two daughters, Alexia and Gabriella.

When his GP said he was in danger of developing diabetes, he was referred to the South Tees Hospital NHS Foundation Trusts weightloss programme.

And after he impressed nursing staff by keeping to a strict diet and losing 2st, he was selected to become the first patient at The James Cook University Hospital, in Middlesbrough, to have weight loss (bariatric) surgery.

Bariatric surgeon Sam Dresner is part of a team of six specialist surgeons who work at James Cook, Darlington Memorial Hospital and the University Hospital of North Durham, in Durham City.

Between them, the three hospitals plan to do about 300 operations a year.

Mr Dresner, who operated on Mr Brown, said: “Once patients have lost weight, there is an improvement in their medical condition, such as diabetes, high blood pressure, heart disease and sleep apnoea.

“If you add up the cost of treating these conditions over the years, the cost of bariatric surgery pales into insignificance,” said Mr Dresner.

That cost of bariatric surgery in the North-East has risen from 2008-9, when it was £1.7m, to 4.6m in 2010-11.

Mr Brown said: “I am a big believer in prevention rather than cure and the surgery is a preventative approach to health care. I was told that if I carried on I would have weighed 40st when I was 40.”

He praised the “superb care” he received from the NHS. “Because it was keyhole surgery all I have got is five little holes in my stomach,” he said.

Since having a gastric bypass, which reduces stomach capacity and reduces appetite, Mr Brown has lost a further two stone and is expected to reach his target weight of 15st in the near future.