Any Medicare patients on the forum??????

pandora · October 25, 2007

<p><p>Hello everyone! I have Medicare which requires to jump through so many hoops before the surgery. I'm just wondering if anyone else has gone through the same thing??? Medicare requires a 3-month doctor/dietician supervised diet pre-op. I guess they want to see if I can lose weight. That really sucks. Also, I have a major amount of paperwork to get together from all of my doctors regarding my medical conditions such as high blood pressure and sleep apnea. And finally, I have to see a psychologist and be cleared for surgery. I guess I just want to know what anyone else has experienced going through Medicare. Thanks a bunch!! Oh, my doctor is Dr. Robert Davis in Houston, Texas. He is on the show "Big Medicine" that airs on TLC just in case anyone wants to know. <img src="http://www.LapBandTalk.com/images/smilies/bandit.gif" border="0" alt="" title="bandit" smilieid="35" class="inlineimg" /></p></p>

sharon160 · October 25, 2007

I'm a medicare patient, but, like you, am just starting my research. I believe that the requirements you are hearing, are your surgeon's requirements and not medicare. From what I' ve heard, medical necessity is medicare's only requriement. But I'm still a couple of weeks from finding out for sure.

sghatl · October 26, 2007

I was told by my doctor that Medicare doesn't do pre-approval. They decide whether to approve or not after you have the surgery. But their medical necessity rules are pretty slack. My doctor just sent paperwork to my secondary insurance to get their approval.

mom2knk · October 26, 2007

I don't have Medicare, but I know someone who does and was banded at some place in Detroit, MI. As far as I know she had to have some testing done before hand (not sure what) but I know she didn't need a letter documenting her weightloss journey. I think she needed a letter from her doctor saying that it was medically necessary, and some other stuff. I do know that once she had all her paperwork in, she had her band done within a month. From what I read, thats awesome. I can find out more from her if any one would like.