THAT Doesn’t Go There: N.O.T.E.S.

There comes a time in some peoples’ lives when they’ll need to have an abdominal surgery. Ce-section, gallbladder and apendix removal, having that alien spore removed…

But really, who wants to deal with the ugly post-srugical scars? Think of all the women in Miami with tummy-tucks and flay-marks from those three kids they never should have had, strutting around in bikinis, looking slightly less fabulous than if their skin was blemish-free?

Thanks to the marvels of science (insert 1950’s B-film music here), a new method of surgery that doesn’t require invasive, skin-splitting incisions has been developed. It’s called natural orifice transluminal endoscopic surgery, or NOTES for short, and it allows doctors to put a scope down your throat, punch a hole in your stomach, and dig around in your belly without getting a scalpel out.

Just recently, Doctors at Northwestern Memorial Hospital removed a man’s gallbladder through his mouth without ever spilling a drop of blood.

This revolutionary procedure may be a good cosmetic option, but what does it do to your stomach? There is some concern that damage to the stomach lining might lead to future complications, but due to the youthfulness of this technology, there are no definitive studies at present to either inflame or subdue concerns.

Personally, I find the idea disturbing, but for the few who can’t get general anesthesia and don’t like have a hypodermic needle burried in their spines, it’s a good alternative. I think everyone else should just get over themselves and go under the knife. Do you want to bleed on the table, or into your stomach and abdominal cavity after the doctors send you home? Yeah. It’s that choice or nothing.

~ by echostarlite on September 12, 2007.