skinny in process

Hello Lynn, I too had my band placed outside of Kaiser back in 2009, I am now a Kaiser member. I started having serious complications with my band this April. My complications seemed to exacerbate from tolerable over the last year to severe over night. I was out of work for two weeks due to how severe the complications were. I must have gone to 5 Dr. appts and several studies with no results. They finally agreed to refer me to a bariatric specialist after a couple weeks of disregarding that the problems were due to the band. I'm in the Orange County region and it seemed like I was getting no where. I forgot to mention that they wouldn't have me see the bariatric specialist until they did one more diagnostic study. I lost 15 lbs in less than 2 weeks because I couldn't hold anything down but liquids. I finally got a call from a nurse from the Orange County bariatric department. By this time I couldn't even hold down Water and felt completely fatigued. The nurse took all my info and was going to try to work on getting me in to see the Bariatric specialist. She went on to explain that even if I was seen at the soonest appt available that they were not going to be able to remove any Fluid from the band or do any adjustments to it. That all band adjustments or any care for it, patients would have to be referred to the South bay bariatric center(Los Angeles County). So in other words I was still left without any help and would continue to suffer until the proper referral was done. She continued to advise me if I was really not feeling well it would be best to go to the South Bay ER, because I would be seen by a bariatric specialist immediately. This was the best advise and help I had received in weeks! I went to the ER that evening and was seen by Dr. Belzberg. I agree with Leyanna's post/reply, He is the best and very informative. He was very straight to the point and said the band was going to have to come out. He took out all the fluid out of the band there in the ER. Said he had to let my esophagus and stomach rest at least a minimum of three weeks before he could remove it and do the sleeve all in one surgery. He scheduled my surgery right there and then. I had my surgery May 1, 2014. I am now 4wks post op. Sorry for such a long story to get to the answer. Yes, Kaiser will do the sleeve if your lap band has to come out even if it was placed by an outside facility. I wasn't asked for previous BMI info, although mine was in the 40's back in 2009. I didn't have to go to any classes or meet any pre-op criteria either. I wish you all the luck and hope you get referred to the right person. Keep us posted!