In 2011, dr. Angelina Postoev, MD, FACS, co-founder IBI Healthcare Institute, with locations in Buford and Loganville, Georgia. She recently opened an office in Tampa, Fla.
Her business plan highlights the inequalities of medical care, which affect millions of black people.
“The aim is to provide affordable surgical services to everyone [and] try to avoid the bureaucracy of insurance and other people trying to tell us what to do, ”she explains. Postoev started the medical practice with her husband, dr. Christopher Ibikunlea general and a bariatric weight loss surgeon.
“When you work for someone else or in a public hospital, you’re just another number, even as a doctor,” she adds. “They tell you what they want you to do as a doctor, and you can not necessarily practice what you think is right because they go by numbers.”
She started practicing in Gwinnett County, about 35 miles outside of Atlanta, and expanded to smaller towns. Postoev noticed the sharp difference between people who had access to care who lived in the city compared to those on the outskirts.
“We try to work with everyone to give everyone similar access, so that’s what drives us, and we started adding more services,” she says.
Postoev and Ibikunle specialize in high-tech procedures that use minimally invasive laparoscopic robotics, such as tummy tuck surgeries, which are not available everywhere. Bariatric weight loss surgeries are very popular in the United States, a result of the gradually rising obesity rates.
This procedure can benefit many Blacks.
Too many African Americans live with high blood pressure and diabetes, both of which are directly related to obesity. Studies show that among African-American adults, an estimated 48% are clinically obese (including 37.1% of men and 56.6% of women, as opposed to 32.6% of whites). Societal factors leading to health inequality in the Black community include unaffordable affordable housing, low income and limited access to quality education, food deserts and the lack of available places to participate in physical activity, based on a report by the American Psychological Association.
Postoev believes the increased rates of obesity, a metabolic disorder, is an epidemic. She notes that Mississippi, Alabama and Georgia come close to a 40% obesity rate— ”four out of ten people [that are] clinically obese. ”
Obesity, she says, needs to be treated chronically, and today’s bariatric surgery is more advanced and has fewer incisions and risks. Patients recover faster.
“Now we have [endoscopic sleeve gastroplasty] what we can do through the mouth without cutting the stomach, ”she shares. Individuals should also make an effort to avoid processed foods and sedentary lifestyles.
As people get older, processed foods affect how the body responds to glucose and how insulin responds, resulting in a metabolic disorder.
African Americans with high blood pressure and diabetes may see their conditions reversed if they treat their obesity with weight loss surgery.
“There are many studies that show that when we treat obesity with bariatric surgery,” says Postoev, noting that she also needs to analyze how long the patient has had the disease and to what extent. “The more serious the disease, the more difficult it is to treat. but many patients will turn around and stop having hypertension and stop taking their medication. Eventually, they can reverse their diabetes. ”
The risks associated with bariatric surgery are minimal. Postoev compares it to removing a gallbladder. However, depending on a patient’s medical history, the game may involve reactions to anesthesia, serious infections, or death.
“Almost anyone can get the operation. But we must remember that the bigger you are, the higher the body mass index, the risks [increase] “Because there can be COPD breathing problems, it is more difficult to wake up from anesthesia,” she says.
“I always warn people about other operations. The risk of infection is quite low. For the bypass and stomach sleeve, the most important thing we worry about in the beginning is leaks, which means when we cut something off and work it back or staple it back together; we have to make sure it heals without leakage. ”
Postoev’s enduring advice for the African-American community is to find a support group and to “Listen to your doctors. Find the right doctor. If you feel that the doctor is not addressing your problems, seek out a weight loss specialist. ”
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