Alex Brecher

You can find some great state by state resources here: http://asmbs.org/resources/ehb-access-toolkit

I'm going to send you an email with your login info.

I know Walter for quite some time now. He's a great patient advocate!

This is Walter Lindstrom's daughter. Fantastic stuff!

Everyone has a craving sometime. It might be for pizza, ice cream, tacos, Pasta, or any of the other foods that you used to eat – or overeat – before weight loss surgery. What do you do when a craving hits? Wait until it passes, even if it’s a few days. Wait a day, and then give in if the craving is still there. Make a healthy substitute, such as sugar-free hot chocolate instead of brownies or light popcorn as a salty, crunchy substitute for potato chips. Have a bit or two of the real thing, since that is the only thing that will satisfy you. Give in. Enjoy your treat, and worry about the consequences tomorrow. Choose your answer, and explain it in the conversation below. Share your tips for dealing with cravings, and include any recipe swaps that you use to deal with your cravings in a healthy way!

We hope to have a new app update released at some point next week.

Thank you so much to those of you who congratulated me on my 11-year surgiversary! I can hardly believe that it has been so long since my surgery! I am still grateful for what still feels like my new, healthy life that includes feeling good about myself, playing with my kids, and working out and loving it! I really enjoy hearing your stories of how BariatricPal has made a positive difference in your lives. I am so glad to be able to provide this forum to support others in their weight loss journeys. It really is a privilege to be able to give back to the weight loss surgery community, and I thank you for all of your support.

There's a setting in your control panel called "Surgery Information." Change your surgery type or you can check off "Show me content from all other surgery types"

Please click REPORT whenever you see spam. We deal with spammers and spam posts pretty quickly. Thanks!!

Innumerable consumers, lawmakers, and healthcare professionals alike celebrated at the passage of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA), also known as Obamacare, in 2010. The ACA expanded healthcare coverage to millions of Americans and promised to put this country’s broken healthcare system on the mend. The law came with an unprecedented focus on preventive medicine and wellness, and nationwide improvements in obesity treatment seemed to be coming. Many weight loss surgery candidates and healthcare professionals, however, have been disappointed. The ACA has plenty of shortcomings when it comes to bariatric surgery. More than half of states do not cover bariatric surgery. Among those that do, many put up barriers to getting the procedure that prevent some weight loss surgery candidates from being able to qualify for reimbursement. Advances in Obesity Coverage Under the ACA The ACA does have some provisions that help to reduce obesity on a national level. It includes $15 billion in funding for wellness and disease prevention programs, many of which will target obesity. Another preventive measure is that the ACA requires restaurant chains to post calorie counts on menus. The ACA requires Medicare providers to cover obesity screening and counseling when you go to the doctor, and many healthcare insurance providers are also providing these services. Another provision of the ACA is that employees in qualifying programs are reimbursed for their healthy behaviors. If they do not smoke, maintain a healthy weight, and have blood pressure and blood cholesterol levels within the normal range, employees can get up to $800 per year. Employees with obesity can get cash back if they lose at least 10 percent of their body weight, but will not receive the money until they reach a BMI under 30. The ACA also forbids health insurance providers to deny you coverage based on pre-existing conditions. Since obesity is now recognized as a disease, according to the American Medical Association (AMA), health insurance providers cannot refuse to accept you just because of your obesity. You also cannot be denied coverage just because you had weight loss surgery in the past. Measurable Benefits Expected With These ACA Provisions Each of the above provisions can lead to small amounts of weight loss. For example, counseling for weight loss can lead to a loss of about 5 percent of body weight on average. This modest weight loss can improve blood sugar, blood pressure, and other measures of health, and it can save you, your provider, and the government money. Limitations/More Is Needed However, if you are a weight loss surgery candidate, losing 5 percent of body weight will still leave you with a good amount of excess body weight. Obesity-related health conditions such as diabetes and arthritis are still a threat, and your obesity is likely to continue to interfere with your daily life. Bariatric surgery can be effective against obesity, and it can also fight diabetes and other conditions. With its potential to treat obesity, you might expect it to be covered under the ACA. Unfortunately, only some states cover it. State by State Differences in Healthcare Coverage – Benchmark Plans The ACA requires states to offer acceptable health insurance plans, but these plans may vary by state. The plans that states can offer to fulfill the requirements are known as benchmark plans. These plans set the minimum level of benefits that a state must provide, and the benefits are based on current plans within a state. So, states where competing private plans do not cover weight loss surgery are not likely to offer Obamacare plans that cover weight loss surgery. To make matters worse, the states that do not cover weight loss surgery tend to be the states with the highest rates of obesity. In effect, the more likely you are to have obesity, the less likely you are to live in a state that covers bariatric surgery. You can find out more about each state’s benchmark plan from the government’s The Center for Consumer Information & Insurance Oversight (CCIIO) within the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) site. Which States Cover Weight Loss Surgery? So far, 22 states cover bariatric surgery. Arizona, California, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Iowa, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Vermont, West Virginia and Wyoming Five states and cover weight loss programs, but do not necessarily cover weight loss surgery. California, District of Columbia, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Mexico Twenty-eight states do not cover bariatric surgery or other extensive obesity treatment. Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia, Washington and Wisconsin Coverage Often Seems Reluctant Even if your health care coverage includes weight loss surgery, it can come with a lot of hoops. For example, you may need to wait a certain number of months or diet to lose a certain amount of weight before you can get the surgery. Your plan may not cover the type of weight loss surgery that you are hoping to get, especially in the case of newer surgery types such as the vertical sleeve gastrectomy (gastric sleeve). There can also be a lifetime limit of one surgery, which does you no good if your first surgery did not work. If surgery is a disease, shouldn't you be entitled to treatment that works? What Can You Do? You can advocate for making weight loss surgery a required service under Obamacare by reaching out to state and federal representatives. If you live in a state where bariatric surgery is already covered, contact your representatives in Congress. If you live in a state where bariatric surgery is not yet covered, contact your Congress people, and also contact your state representatives. In your letter, phone call, or email to your representative, explain what bariatric surgery means to you and to the thousands of others like you. Explain why you need it to lose weight, and how you feel that it could impact your life. Describe the obstacles and health problems that you face because of obesity. Your goal is to convince the representative that weight loss surgery needs to be covered. If weight loss surgery is the only effective treatment for obesity, it should be included in a healthcare plan. Otherwise, we will continue to struggle with these same problems because not everyone can afford the thousands of dollars it takes to get the surgery done.

Today, BariatricPal celebrates its 11th birthday! I am very proud of this accomplishment and of our dedicated BariatricPal members who have made the last 11 years possible. How It All Started I got the lap-band and came home from the hospital on July 2th 2003. Almost immediately, I went online to find out the answers to some of my questions and to share experiences with other weight loss surgery patients. To my dismay, I could not find an online social site that met my needs. The very next day, I started LapBandTalk.com with the goal of providing a welcoming community for lap-band patients and potential patients to provide support, encouragement, and advice to each other. The Evolution of BariatricPal LapBandTalk.com took off, and I eventually started VerticalSleeveTalk.com for gastric sleeve pre and post-op patients, RNYTalk.com for gastric bypass pre and post-op patients, and SleevePlicationTalk.com for sleeve plication pre and post-op patients. In 2013, 10 years after the launch of LapBandTalk.com, I decided to merge the boards into BariatricPal.com. This single community retains the welcoming environment of the individual boards, but has a stronger voice in advocating for weight loss surgery as a way to fight obesity. We Hit Post Number 3.5 Million! BariatricPal is still growing. Our community includes hundreds of thousands of members and 7 million monthly site visits. Our most recent milestone is an impressive 3.5 millionth post, which we hit on July 10! Don’t forget that the lucky poster who made post number 3.5 million will receive a free copy of my latest book: The Big Book on Bariatric Surgery: Living Your Best Life After Weight Loss Surgery. Thank you for your continued support. Without your participation and feedback, BariatricPal would not be the top site that it is today. I am truly grateful for all that you do. Sincerely, Alex

Pawn Star’s Corey Harrison will be on Good Morning America today between 7–9 AM ET. He will be discussing his recent 193 weight loss thanks to LAP-BAND. Let us know if you watch GMA this morning and hear about his amazing transformation.

Your name has been removed from the post.

Thanks! Please remember to leave a review if you purchased via Amazon!

Really appreciate all the congrats! I'm going out to celebrate Hope everyone has an awesome weekend!

Today is the 11-year anniversary of my ‪LAP-BAND‬ surgery! I have lost and kept off over 100 pounds, and I'm loving life! It has been a wonderful journey, and I am so grateful. I'm so proud of our weight loss surgery community!

Thanks!!

Thanks!! Where was he cited ? How'd you get this info ?

I keep seeing this gorgeous picture of a sculpture all over social media. If anyone knows more info about this pic, let me know! I'd LOVE to have something like this created!

Great article, Jill!!

Amazon has the first 90 day exclusive. Once it's over, you'll see the book on iTunes and elsewhere.

Please make sure to leave a review if you purchase via Amazon. Thanks in advance for your awesome 5 star review

Wow, now I'm being threatened via FaceBook by "Whitney Uberdriver": "Do not act like I am attacking this woman! She has been coming at me for the last 48 hours! I have extreme experience in SEO and building very powerful websites. You have no chance when it comes to attempting to ruin my name. You are running a company that can be run into the ground. This is not how you should be doing business." Then I get this threat: Followed by another threat: "I see you just released another book too on Amazon. I and several others have read it. I think we are all entitled to a review.... right?" I think Uber should know how abusive one of their drivers is behaving online.....

Behave yourself! My 11th year Lap-Bandiversary is coming up in one week.

He lost his credibility ages ago.