It is not common practice to use bonded aluminium panels as repairs.
The simplest repair would be to rivet an external doubler/patch
to the skin.
You are right, skin-splice, that it is not common practice to use bonded repairs on metallic aircraft at present, but eventually the civil world will realise that adhesive bonded repairs are far more effective and can save very significant costs compared to mechanical repairs.
I have over thirty seven years experience with adhesive bonded repairs to metallic military aircraft. In one example, bonded composite patches were used to repair widespread stress corrosion cracking in C-130E wing planks. These repairs enabled the RAAF to be the only operator in the world to fly the C-130E through its life of type without replacing the wing planks. That has been estimated to have saved an audited AUD130 million. The USAF used bonded composite patches to repair C-141 and that saved billions compared to replacing the wing skins. Mechanical repairs were not an option because they could not meet damage tolerance requirements and did not provide adequate restraint of crack growth.
With skin as thin as the area in question on the 737, I would bet the family jewels that I could design a bonded repair that would never fail and would be stronger than the metal itself. In comparison, in a mechanically fastened repair the joint strength will always be limited by the stress concentrations caused by the fastener. Lets be clear. If tested to failure, an appropriately designed and correctly processed adhesive bond will break in the metal outside the repair. A mechanical repair would break at the fastener line at a much lower load.
There is a significant amount of data on bonded repairs to metallic structure. I suggest you look at
Adhesion Associates for a start.
Regards
blakmax