WHAT DO PATIENTS, FAMILIES AND SOCIETY EXPECT FROM THE BARIATRIC SURGEON

The expectations of patients, their families and society of the bariat ric surgeon are often unrealistic, but for different reasons. The morb idly obese patient often expects 'everything' from bariatric surgery. The patient's family is frequently ambivalent. Society, on the other h and, tends to unrealistically regard the morbidly obese as billboards advertising them as willful deviants whose problems can all be resolve d by 'just pushing away from the table'. This invalid stereotype has p rompted some to incorrectly regard bariatric surgery as an undeserved reward for individuals who will not control their own behavior. The un deserved intentional deviant status of the morbidly obese causes membe rs of society to harass, mock or otherwise mistreat this subpopulation . Society's harmful, destructive and unjust weight harassment 'fat-ism ' has made the morbidly obese modern day moral equivalents of lepers. We conclude that society must be persuaded to accept weight harassment as 'politically incorrect', subject to the same consequences as any o ther form of bigotry. Once society regards the morbidly obese as victi ms, not perpetrators, of their nonsurgically curable disease, bariatri c surgery results should become held to similar standards as surgery f or carcinoma, cardiovascular and other diseases. Until then, the morbi dly obese remain the last true bastion of prejudice. (C) 1998 Rapid Sc ience Ltd.