amount of fills

ShanaMarie · February 19, 2004

I know everybody's different...but I was wondering how many cc's you all got for your first fills.

I go for my first fill on Tuesday and of course I don't want to get sick or anything, but my Dr. only does fills on Tuesdays so I have to skip classes and drive 2 hours there and 2 hours back just to do it so it's kinda hard to work around. My point is, I want enough of a fill that I won't have to go back in a few weeks. I'm planning on telling all of this to my Dr., I just wanted to get a good idea of what a reasonable first fill amount would be.

Alexandra · February 19, 2004

Hi Shana,

My doctor and many others I have heard of take the "right amount the first time" approach. That means they fill your band until there is a certain level of restriction that you can live with, as evidenced by the way Water or barium flows through. There is simply no way to assess what actual amount of Fluid is going to create that level of restriction in your band. So the numbers are completely meaningless. My doctor refused to tell me how much my first fill was, because he was so against comparing that number with that of other people.

Other doctors take a "sneak-up-on-it" approach, and for them it might be appropriate to put in .5 cc the first time just to see what that does to you. If that's your doctor's approach, you may not feel any appreciable restriction after your first fill.

In either case it's probably not likely that they'd want you to return for at least a few weeks. It's important that you give it some time to see how you react. I'd suggest you should ask the doctor which of these approaches he's planning to take with you, and if he says the latter you might ask him why not the former. If he says the former, you have a great chance of getting the fill you want no matter what the numbers are.

Good luck, and let us know how it goes!