Anesthesia for jejunoileal shunt: review of 88 cases

Experience with 88 obese pateints undergoing jejunoileal shunt is reviewed, with emphasis on preoperative preparation and assessment, conduct of anesthesia, postoperative care, and anesthesia-related complications. There was no intraoperative mortality, and postoperative morbidity was minimal. The operation can be viewed as a short-term answer to the malignancy of massive obesity, since physiologic abnormalities are reversible; however, only hospitals that can provide full surgical, medical, endocrinologic, and anesthesia services, backed by modern ancillary investigative ability, should perform this operation.