The weight is no longer sticking to him.
A Texas man is halfway to his 90-pound weight loss goal after undergoing a new bariatric surgery option that involves magnets.
“I’ve been able to do fantastic improvements in my quality of life, and so I’m very, very happy and fulfilled, and feel like I’ve turned back the time,” Kenneth Yerrid, 50, told the NBC affiliate in Dallas/Fort Worth last week.
Yerrid faced a higher risk of heart disease and stroke because he had high blood pressure, diabetes and high cholesterol — a trinity that forms the basis of metabolic syndrome.
When diet and exercise failed to make an impact, Yerrid agreed to become the first person in Texas to make use of the Levita Magnetic Surgical System (MARS).
“It felt like I was in quicksand,” Yerrid said in a statement last month. “I had aches and pains in my joints and that caused me to gain weight. I was not eating healthy. It wasn’t until I had the surgery that I was able to start on a path to improving my health.”
MARS won clearance from the Food and Drug Administration in August 2023 for abdominal procedures, including gall bladder removal and bariatric surgery. Cleveland Clinic used the technique shortly thereafter for a gastric sleeve procedure.
Here’s how it works: A grasper with a small magnetic end is placed under the skin to grip and retract tissue and organs. The grasper is controlled by an external magnet on a robotic arm. The surgeon operates that robotic arm and a second arm that holds a camera to see inside the patient.
California-based Levita Magnetics promises fewer surgical incisions, resulting in less pain, faster recovery, and fewer scars.
“In a gastric bypass, you make the stomach smaller and then redirect the food channel,” Dr. Chad Carlton of Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital Plano, who performed the surgery on Yerrid, explained to the NBC station. “Redirecting the food channel helps [Yerrid] control satiety, appetite, hunger, and gives him direct control of those metabolic diseases, specifically diabetes, high blood pressure and sleep apnea.”
Carlton said using the magnetic surgical system allowed him to avoid making a painful incision under Yerrid’s breastbone during his March operation.
Now, Yerrid’s down 45 pounds — and his blood pressure, cholesterol levels and diabetic markers have improved.
“I can take my dogs for a walk now,” he gushed. “I can do light exercise. It’s been a game changer.”