insurance coverage for post operation complications

[freddie8_8 37]

I assume most of you going to Mexico for vsg surgery are like myself and either have no health insurance or your health insurance coverage doesn't cover bariatric surgery. I have two health policies and apparently neither policy covers bariatric surgery as it is not legally mandated in my state. After reading the forum about post op complications on this site, I asked the question what if I come back from mexico and develop complications like a leak or stricture. I checked my policies and my first policy is silent about if post op elective surgery complications are covered. That means maybe they are and maybe they are not. The insurance rep could not give me a definitive answer. The second policy does cover post op complications of elective surgery but the insurance rep on the phone originally gave me the wrong answer. It helped that I had the 100 page policy in front of me to correct her.

The reason I am posting this is that for those of you traveling to mexico to get vsg surgery or even elective vsg surgery in the U.S. you may want to examine the fine print of your health insurance policy if you are fortunate to be covered by one to see if it covers post op complications for elective surgery. If it doesn't you could be faced with large medical bills should you be one of the unfortunate ones to come down with post op complications as you could be facing very large medical bills.

[SeahawksFan 444]

I self paid for my surgery but I did not go to Mexico. My BMI wasn't high enough otherwise they would have covered it. I did end up getting dehydrated and had to go to the ER a week after surgery and luckily my insurance covered that visit. ER alone was $4K. 3 Bags of IV is pricey.

~LA