CaroleK

I'm going out on a limb here - and this won't be a happy post so if you're not in the mood to read a vent from someone who isn't in love with being banded ... maybe this is time for you to stop reading. I was banded 1/13/06. I just 'celebrated' 3 years with my Lap-Band. Honestly - the band itself isn't horrible. But the situation I am in stinks. Slightly less than a year after banding I relocated to the town of Hick-City in the state of Podunk - in the far recesses of the Deep Fried South. I have tried for the past two years to find a Lap-Band surgeon who is reasonably close (no more than a 2 hour drive if I can manage it) who will see another surgeon's patients for follow-up and who will treat said patients like a human being. So far ... no luck. I've found two docs who will see me - but neither of them are men that I trust or can work with. Doc #1 - I made an appointment for a consultation. He walks in tells me he's on call on the surgical floor and he doesn't do appointments when he's on call so he only has 5 minutes. I'm paying for a consult - out of pocket - and he's only giving me 5 minutes for $150.00??? It got worse though when we had this exchange: Doc: "So you're here to discuss getting a Lap-Band?" Me: "No. I'm post-op. As I told your receptionist I'm looking for a doctor for aftercare." Doc: "You don't look like an after. Are you sure you had surgery?" Me: :sneaky: Scratch him off the list. Things went down hill from there - including his office billing both me and my insurance company under an incorrect code so he got paid for something my insurance company doesn't cover. Doctor #2 - Well, he and I have very different ideas of what is safe. He wants me to be so tight that I can only eat 600 - 800 calories per day. I don't think that a 600 - 800 calorie per day diet is safe and I don't think being that tight is safe. Neither, by the way, does my original surgeon. Doc #2 really capped it though the day I went in for a slight unfill because I was so tight that every single thing I at hurt (including mashed potatoes and thick blended soups) and he said, "Eating is supposed to hurt. If it doesn't hurt people like you won't stop eating and you'll never lose weight." I have a band that is now not tight enough to provide true restriction I'm not losing weight. To add insult to injury I also have no doctor to do fills or be available if I have a complication. I want to have the band removed. At this point it isn't doing me any good. I cannot afford 3 days and hotels and gas to go back to my surgeon every time I need a fill. I cannot find a doctor who will accept me as a patient. I am not willing to be treated like crap just to have a doctor. So right now I'm thinking this Lap-Band was the biggest mistake I've ever made. I have $17,000 worth of surgery that is completely useless to me. Yet when I dare to say that I'm not happy with my decision someone invariably stands up and tells me it's my own fault for not looking hard enough to find a doctor or not being willing to be treated like dirt just to have a doc who wants to overfill me. I'm not in a happy place. Has anyone had their band voluntarily removed without complications? Am I really that big a freak?

I called Dr. Groves' office ... and yes they will take me as a patient. Unfortunately the start up cost to join their program is out of my financial reach right now. $1,500.00 just to join their program and then $100.00 for fills. The cost of the fills is no problem but I don't have the cash for the start up fee right now. Back to the drawing board. If I had known it would be this hard to find follow up care I would never have chosen the Lap-Band.

Depends on when you ask me. I have not had any physical complications with my band. I have had complications in finding a doctor after moving. That has slowed down my weight loss considerably. Are there times when I wish my life didn't include a necessity for follow-up care? Yes. That being said I would never have had a malabsorption procedure. It was a restrictive procedure or nothing. If I can find a doctor that I can work with who isn't a ridiculous distance away and can get back on track I'll probably be back to saying I don't regret it. Right at the moment though - yeah. I do a little. But I also know that nothing is perfect and all we can do is research our options and choose what we feel is the best option at that time.

Thanks, Determined! I'll give his office a call. I can't remember if I'd called before or not. But I think I'm due for my semi-annual round of calls anyway. :thumbup:

I'm not sure. LOL I haven't lived her long enough to really know where anything is. I don't actually live in Huntsville - but a small town about 35 miles west of Huntsville. Okay ... Mapquest says I'm about an hour from Albertville. So that's where Albertville is. I learn something new every day. :thumbup: I never realized how big of a city Tampa really is until I moved here. Don't get me wrong - I like living here way more than I did Tampa. But I have gotten a taste of what rural really means.

That's true. I may yet find someone. I guess I'm just frustrated and a bit worried. I mean if something does go wrong I'm up a creek. I guess it hit home with me this month because I'm under a ton of stress because my mom has been very ill and hospitalized 3 times in 1.5 months. I ended up with a stress headache from hell and increased blood pressure. When my doctor wanted to put me on a high dosage NSAID and muscle relaxant we had to have a lengthy discussion about the NSAID risks vs benefits. Which made me wonder what I'd do if the NSAIDs caused a problem with my band. Thanks so much for your thoughts ... I think, though, if I cannot find a reliable doc within a reasonable distance within the next year I might consider removal. Either that or a revision. Edited to add: Kat - I took the positive note from your message and did another search for Lap-Band surgeons and noticed something new on the search feature at the lapband.com site. It's an option for "Accepts Out of Town Patients" . That's new ... well I searched and two docs (in the same practice) came up with that qualifier. So I'm going to call their office tomorrow. Wish me luck.

Roughly 4 hours - 5 on a bad day.

I just don't think that it is healthy or good for my metabolism to do 800 calories a day for any length of time. I've been told by more than one doctor (including two bariatric physicians) and two nutritionists that anything less than 1200 calories per day and you're unable to get even the basic nutritional needs. From my research and things that I've heard from other doctors I just don't believe it is healthy. I also cannot tolerate a fill level tight enough to be satisfied with 800 calories per day. If I am that tight I end up sliming and getting things stuck. I've been there and I know that's not healthy.

Thanks Kat. Even my surgeon (in FL) has called doctors in Alabama looking for someone who will take a patient that they didn't do surgery on. He has been unable to find anyone (he's looking not only for me but for a patient who travels in this area of the country for his job). I keep calling, including doctors that I've already called hoping that they'll change their minds. I'm just not comfortable with driving more than 2 or 3 hours (tops) because if something goes wrong I don't want to be that far from my doctor. I had a fill that "caught up" with me two days later and I was PBing everything. Then I had a medication induced gastritis that swelled my stoma shut and I was PBing on Water. Driving the 45 minutes to my doctor's office was hard enough - I cannot imagine having to drive 3, 4 or more hours in that condition. Maybe I'm being unrealistic - but that's how I feel right now. I also feel like it shouldn't be this hard to find another doctor - but apparently it is.

His point was that I should be so tight that I am "satisfied" with small enough quantities of food to be eating no more than 600 - 800 calories per day. His description of the "ideal" dietary intake for me would be 4 ounces of lean Protein 3 times per day and then literally one or two bites of vegetables.

I've never had a fill done by anyone but a doc. I know they can't make me have more fluid than I will take - but Doc #2 has said that my attitude is "non-compliant." So he might refuse to work with me if I don't do things his way.

I have an appointment on Friday with a new doctor for a consultation and a fill. Here's my dilemma. Due to major stresses and a total lack of concentration I've stayed still for several months playing with the same 5 pounds. Up 2 down 3 up 4 down 1.5 ... I haven't had a fill in more than 6 months. I'm tight enough in the mornings that eating isn't something I'm usually willing to try doing. I occasionally have a "first bite syndrome" reaction to food. By lunch I'm able to eat without problems (usually). By dinner time I'm able to eat just about anything at all in any quantity I could desire. I'm also not staying full for very long. In March, while on vacation in Florida, I had a cold and I took some cold medicine that irritated my stomach and I had some horrible swelling. So I went to my surgeon (thankfully I was on vacation in my old home town). He did a fluoro and said that my band is perfectly placed and despite the swelling I was pretty "open." I'm pretty sure that I need a slight adjustment to my band. But my dilemma is that I don't want to rely totally on my band and I don't want to be overfilled (been there and done that once). I will, of course, be discussing this with the new surgeon and see what he thinks. But in the meantime I'm trying to figure out what I think I should do. I'm leaning toward a slight fill. What would you do? I'm just looking for ideas and comments here. Not anything definitive. Thanks.

That is awesome! Congratulations! Whoohooo!

Am I successful? Yes, I think I am. Am I happy? Yes. I have one minor regret. That I wasted time dithering about rather than actually doing something about my excess weight before I hit 310 pounds. What do I love most about my Lap-Band? I love that I've been banded for 16 months. I lost 52 pounds in 7 months. Then I hit a super stressful and busy period in my life were I made a major change. My husband and I decided to leave Florida and move to Northern Alabama to be closer to my parents (who were moving there from Florida). He quit his job without another job lined up, we sold our house and bought a house in Alabama and we moved. We attended a family reunion, I traveled from FL to AL 5 times in 3.5 months to check on construction of our home. We kept an eye on my parents' house during construction and I argued with the contractor several times. I traveled to Florida to help my parents move. And we took a vacation back to Florida to see friends and family. During all of that I gained weight. Yup. I bounced around in a 5 pound range. Some days up 2. Some days down 1. Other days up 4. But I never left that 5 pound range. I didn't pay attention to what I was eating. In fact I ate out a lot while traveling and while my kitchen was packed. I didn't count calories. I didn't watch the nutritional content of my food. I didn't consciously limit my intake. And I didn't gain. And that is without an optimal fill level. It has taken me several months to find a doctor in reasonable traveling distance from my new home for fills. Now I've found one and I have an appointment next week for a consultation and fill. In the days before my Lap-band I would have never made it though the last several months without gaining. In fact I would have gained a good 20 or 30 pounds during period like that. If I had never had the band I would never have had the courage to make a change like moving from Florida - but if I had I'd have weighed 310 pounds when I made the move and the gained another 20, 30 or perhaps more pounds. I'd be living in this new town weighing 330 or more pounds. So while I'm not a "success story" yet because I'm not done losing - I am a success because my band has totally changed my life.

Yeah. Unfortunately I know that I have a panniculectomy in my future. There is no way that my "apron" will do anything but get worse as I lose weight. And it's already causing me problems between the rash underneath it and the way it bounces about it makes exercise uncomfortable. I'm planning to start now making visits to my doctor's office to document these issues. If I can get insurance to cover the panniculectomy then I'll probably spring for a boob job for myself. If I have to self-pay then the girls will just have to be saggy 'cause the tummy is my priority.

Hello everyone. My name is Carole. I'm a 38 (will in little more than a week I'll be 38) wife of 12.5 years and mom of 11 years to my amazing daughter. I had Lap-Band surgery with Dr. Krishnaraj in Dade City, FL on January 13, 2006. I was 305 at my pre-op appointment and I now weight 253. So I've lost 52 pounds. My highest weight was somewhere over 310 pounds, but I don't know how much over since my scale stopped weighing me. That was 1 month before my pre-op appointment. In October of 2006 I moved to Alabama, more than 620 miles away from my surgeon Dr. Krishnaraj and my fill doctor Dr. DiCicco and their practice with Dr. Lee Grossbard. So it has been several months since I had a fill. Which I most definitely need. The "up" side is that during the two months leading up to my move I managed to get through 5 trips to AL to search for a house, build the house and close on the house, my husband quitting a job in Florida to move t Alabama where he didn't have a job, supervising my parents' home construction, getting my parents moved here and a vacation to Florida and I've only bounce around a 5 pound range. I have not gained any weight. It took me several month to find a doctor within a reasonable distance who would accept another doctor's patient. The excellent news is that I have an appointment for a consultation and a fill with a doctor in Nashville, TN on this coming Friday. So that's me in a nutshell (and believe me this nut needs to be in a shell).

Thank you all for the warm welcome. I'm looking forward to reading more and getting to know more of you! Karla, it was a concern of mine even before I had surgery. I knew that sometimes patients who had surgery in Mexico had a hard time finding a doctor for aftercare, but I was assured it wouldn't be problematic if I had surgery in the U.S. and moved or had my doc retire (or any of the things that can happen). Surprise surprise. When it came right down to it I ended up moving to an area where it was extremely problematic. I was beginning to think I'd have to break down and take three days out of my schedule to drive to Florida (12 hours in each direction) when I got a recommendation for a doctor in Nashville (only 2 hours in each direction). I'm happy with both my 52 pound loss (57 if I count my pre-consult weight loss in the two weeks before my appointment) and my maintaining ... but now it is definitely time to ditch the excuses, get that fill and get off this self-made plateau. Again, thank you all so much for your warm welcome!