DianaG

Keep Smiling! BE HAPPY! Congrats!!:sad:

If I were you, I would rejoice about the pregnancy , and ask the surgeon if he would consider applying the money as a "pre-payment" for the surgery at a future date!! I am sure he would, and perhaps that way you could avoid any increase in price of the surgery between now and when you get it. Just a thought!:sad:

As others have said, after a fill my doc has me go on liquids for the next 48 hours. Then I can start adding mushies and regular food back slowly. Seems to work for me.

Hey Gatorgal, I just read your post to my DH and told him that I am sure hoping someday that I can make a post of my own about buying a size 14 again!!!! You give me hope!!:thumbup:

I was given the liquid hydrocodone and it helped me a lot. Can't imagine even being given a pill to crush and take with applesauce right after surgery! If the pain meds make you nauseous, call your doctor and ask for some phenergan...it really helps a lot. Good luck to you...keep telling yourself that it will get better!!!

I take Centrum Silver chewable (I'm OLD!:cursing:) and twice a day I take a chewable calcium with vitamins K&D.

I have had bread get "stuck". My surgeon says that bread seems to be one of the things most people have trouble with. He says that bread forms a "dough ball" and you will have the urge to drink Water to help "wash" it down. He says that whatever you do, do not drink as it will just pool up on top of the dough ball and make things worse. I asked him what I should do when bread is stuck and he said to get up and walk around, hold your arms over you head, and be patient because the bread will sooner or later pass on through. Not fun!!

Hey Tiffany, it looks like this is a case where basic pays better than standard, as long as you go to a preferred facility! That's great! :cursing: Courtney, I can't believe what an ignorant person you talked to on the phone!! Obviously you will never be able to explain anything to her!:cursing: You can talk to her until you are blue in the face and all she will tell you is the same thing over and over. She has dug in her heels and won't move. It may well be that she is sticking to the clinic's policy of having a 3 mo diet, but it is certainly not the policy of BCBS FEP. I suggest that you call and ask to speak to her supervisor. You may even have better luck if you make an appointment to go see her supervisor!! There has to be someone there who has dealt with our insurance program. If you do go to see the supervisor, you could give her/him the phone# off the back of your ins. card and have them call while you are sitting there. The Ins. co. representative should be able to explain what the requirements are. You could also tell them about all of us on this site who have had the surgery and that it HAS paid for us. Just some thoughts. Hope you can get some positive answers! I'll keep my fingers crossed!

Courtney, I just now noticed that you mentioned that your surgeon was in the basic network. Good Deal! One thing I don't understand is that if your BMI is 40.3, how come they are still saying that you need the supervised diet. The brochure I quoted the info from doesn't make any distinction about the requirements for Basic of Standard. It only makes a distinction about the payment of benefits and how much is owed. It wouldn't hurt to call the phone# on the back of your ins. card and ask them why if your BMI is 40 or over, you were told that you would have to do this but that a friend (me:wink2:) with a BMI of over 40 had the surgery in July and was not required to have a supervised diet. I do have several co-morbidities, but was told that those didn't matter since I was over 40 BMI. After all, the requirements are supposed to be the same in every state!! Sometimes I think that the answers to questions vary between personnel. Whoever answers, the phone one time may not tell you what the other person told you on a previous call! O.K. I am done ranting now.:closedeyes:

Just checked to see what my BMI was when I started this process..it was 43. Bridget, where in NE are you located?. I have a son and daughter-in-law who live in the Omaha area.

Hey, Bridget that is great! Your approval was even faster than mine! Courtney, I asked the RN in charge of the lapband program, at my clinic, about losing weight while pre-surgery. Not that I thought I would lose tons of weight before surgery:rolleyes2: I was particularly interested in what would happen if I lost weight while on the liquid pre-surgery diet. She told me that the weight that mattered was the weight you started at and that was what they based the approval of the surgery on. You might check with whoever is the charge of the program you are in to see if they do the same thing. That might help. Although a PB&J sounds pretty great to me:lol:!! I assume you are going to a "preferred" (by BCBS FEP)surgeon and hospital? It sure does save a lot of money. You are all going to be so glad that you got the surgery! I am 3 months out now and have lost 32 lbs. When I went in to see my surgeon Tuesday, he said that I didn't need a fill now, but in a little while he would start "tweaking" the band to get me to the "green zone"! Can't wait!!!!! Keep me posted on what goes on with ya'll. I am really interested and will be the "cheerleader" for ya!:closedeyes:

Hi again, Sorry if I misslead anyone about this issue of BCBS FEP!:closedeyes: I have had so much trouble getting people to realize the difference between our insurance and the regular BCBS that I jumped in to tell ya'll about my lap band experience with the insurance and I didn't even think about the difference between the standard and basic. Courtney, I have standard and when you mentioned basic, I pulled out my booklet from BCBS FEP and read it again. I can see now where the difference may be.... On page 52 at the bottom of the page it says: "....a condition in which an individual has a Body Mass Index (BMI) of 40 or more, or an individual with a BMI of 35 or more with co-morbidities who has failed conservative treatment; " I had a BMI of over 40, so if yours is between 35(with co-morbidities) and 40, it looks like that is where the medically supervised statement comes in. I apologize again for not checking it further before I spoke:blushing:. Courtney, have they scheduled your surgery yet? There is one thing that you might want to check out though, and that is the difference in the co-payment amounts between Standard and Basic. I know that the amount of monthly premiums is more for standard ($356.59) than basic ($216.48), but it also pays higher co-pays than basic. So you might want to see if it would be cheaper to change to Standard for a year, have the surgery, and they you could change back to the basic next year. There is an "open season" each year starting in November and during that time you can change companies, or coverages without any penalties or pre-existing conditions being a factor. Of course you will have to see how much the monthly premium for standard and basic will be in 2010!:w00t: Again, sorry for causing any confusion, but hope some of what I have told you will be of help!

I also had my gall bladder out before the lap band(same surgeon did both). In fact it was taken out in 1998. It was done laproscopically also. I have had other abdominal surgeries that were open (appendectomy and hysterectomy). I know that scar tissue builds up in the abdomin after any of these surgeries, but it must not have bothered my surgeon because he did not mention it after he put in the lap band. So unless something unusual is going on, I can't see why they would want to do an open surgery on you. Also, I was in a lot of pain with my gall bladder attacks and never once was I refused pain medication. They usually prescribed a generic hydrocodone/tylenol for the pain and it really helped a lot. If it makes you nauseous, they can give you phenergan for that. The hydrocodone/tylenol in liquid form is what the surgeon gave me after the lapband. Sure hope you get some help soon. Do you have regular doctor you could see for some help with the pain? You might seriously consider finding another surgeon like your husband suggested. Good luck to you.

Hi again, Yes, the purpose of the 2 week liquid diet (I had Optifast Protein drinks) is to clear your liver of fat. The doc told me that 2 weeks is plenty to clean out your liver and for some reason I thought that it would have taken much longer...boy am I glad it didn't!! Even though the Optifast came in strawberry, choc, and vanilla, I got tired of it fast. I was glad that more would not have gotten my liver any cleaner from fat and I didn't have to drink any more:thumbup: One thing we know now ladies, is that our livers are becoming healthier than they were before. I am so glad that I could offer a little bit of information and that it was useful to ya'll. Good luck and please let me know how things are going with you.

Hi again, My husband has offered to add some more info here that might be very useful in dealing with your provider. So I'll let him type now: The Federal Employee Health Benefit Program is an annual contract between insurance companies and the Federal Government. The benefits and requirements are the same in all 50 States. The booklet provided by the company you have chosen spells everything out; but, some things need a little additional explanation. However, if a procedure is approved by a company it is the same everywhere.....no exceptions. The coverage provided to Federal Employees is not directly related to coverage offered to others by the same company. Now, not all companies provide the same coverage. Diana and I have elected Blue Cross Blue Shield (BCBS). When she started considering lap band surgery, she contacted the individual at BCBS responsible for the Federal program in both ARkansas and the one in Missouri to make sure that we would not encounter any problems. Both, cited the same necessities as far as co-morbidity, etc. was concerned. My advice is to go to the individual responsible for the lap band program at your location. Explain that you are in contact with others who have had the lap band procedure and are covered by BCBS. Tell the provider that these folks are telling you exactly what they had to pay for and what was required prior to approval and that none of this can vary State to State because of the Federal contract. If you are still encountering problems ask the provider (Clinic, hospital) to call the Federal rep for your State. Diana was asked to do some initial research by our provider. When she contacted BCBS they said, "That the Clinic is having you do their work for them. Usually we are contacted directly by the provider." But, they gave Diana the info, she gave it to the provider. We did encounter one situation where the provider was unsure about payment. They called BCBS and were told, over the phone, we will pay....do it! O.K. I'm back:tongue_smilie: Just another quick thought..The billing for the lapband at my clinic is separate from the billing for the rest of the clinic. They have one lady who does the finance stuff (ins. selfpay.etc) for the lapband patients. She is the one who called the ins. co and was told that yes indeed they will pay for the procedure. If we can be of any more help, let us know. Also, if you haven't already, search for this topic on this site.

Hello all, My fills were included in the total cost for up to a year. I have only been banded since July 27th, so I won't have to pay for one before June of 2010. Don't know how much they will charge then, if I still have to have them. Abby, since BCBS FEP does not require the supervised diet, I would see if they would even pay for the visits to the diatician/doctor for something they don't even require!! I would bet they would balk at that! I had to see the diatician twice before my surgery and they did pay for those visits. She is always available for phone calls and emails about my diet. I attend a support group and the diatician as well as the RN in charge of the program are always there also. That adds up to a lot of supervision/time for conversation with her without having to go through the 3 month deal when your ins. doesn't require it. I have learned over the last 42 years of having Federal Employee insurance, that you have to really be insistant that the billing dept. of doctors, clinics, hospitals, really, really understand that it is NOT like the local programs. Good luck to you all.

My surgeon had me on a two week liquid diet to clear the fat from the liver. He warned me that if I cheated on the diet that he would "pull out" if he saw a fatty liver. He said that it made the surgery more risky for his patient and he would not put the patient in danger because of the challenge of operating with a fatty liver. He would have you start all over with the liquid diet and try again. Turns out that my liver was not fatty, but was really large. He made the decision to go ahead and band me,because a repeat of the liquid diet wouldn't shrink my liver any more. It did make the surgery more challenging for him and I did end up with a couple of lacerations to my liver. That was extremely painful and he kept me in the hospital a couple of extra days. I am really glad that he went ahead and installed the band, because if he had pulled out because of my naturally large liver, I more than likely wouldn't have had the courage to let him try it again later!! So there you have it....it is really a lot safer for you if you have stuck to the preop diet and cleared the fat from your liver.

Lisa, I must say that I am impressed with your mental attitude and your weight loss. You have a great ability to step back from the situation that faces you and to readjust your thinking and act on it. You should be very proud of yourself:thumbup:

Ya got that right! Keep at it and they will finally understand. Let us know how it goes.:confused:

I don't know what could cause that feeling so long after eating. I would suggest that you call your doctor. At least then you would have an answer and that might provide some peace of mind.

Let us know what you find out.

I love sugar free gum. I was using it until I read, somewhere on this forum, that if you accidentally swallow it you may have a "stuck" episode of very painful proportions! You may even have to have the fill saline removed so that the gum can pass on through!!!! It seems that our digestive juices and papaya enzyme can't dissolve gum. I really hated to give it up...but I have.

Congrats!! You are now on the way to a new, healthy, you!!! Binders?!:thumbdown: I never heard of that!!! The only thing that I had for support was a small pillow to hold tight across my tummy to help support it in case I sneezed, coughed, or hit a bump in the road on my way home from the hospital. That did help a lot. Good luck to you!

My surgeon does not require everyone to have a sleep study before surgery. Having said that, I do have sleep apnea that was diagnosed well before I even started the lap band process. My husband was diagnosed with sleep apnea several years ago. Sleep apnea is a serious thing. It can contribute to several health issues, such as heart problems, high blood pressure and strokes. It doesn't mean that you just snore loudly! My internist explained to me that when you have an episode of not breathing, your body reacts just like it would if someone put a pillow over your face to suffocate you. When you have sleep apnea this means that several times a night your body has to react to the sensation of suffocation. Adrenalin flows, heart pounds, you have oxygen depletion, etc. Think about it...that can't be good for you!!! Since being on CPAP's, my husband and I both feel a lot better and have more energy and are not being suffocated multiple times a night! So all sleep centers and sleep studies, are certainly NOT scams. Sleep apnea and associated health problems can take years off your life. After your test, if you don't have sleep apnea, be happy. But if you do have it, be glad it was found and please use your CPAP. It is a tool to be used to help your get a healthier life, just like the lapband does!

Man, I am feeling really, really lucky! Sure I have had the pain and been in bandster hell with hunger,but I have an excellent surgeon, support group,diatician, etc. My surgeon is the only one who gives me my fills and is patient and understanding. The first fill he put in 2cc's, the next time I found out why you have to do fills in different amounts for different people!. He put in 2cc's more to bring me up to 4 cc's. Then I took a few sips of Water and the pain hit me in the middle of the chest! It was so bad that it started to affect my breathing. The surgeon then removed 1cc. That was such a relief. He told me to come back in a week. Well, the week went by and I was eating anything I wanted! Today was a week from that fill, so I went back to see him again. He told me that he was going to only put in 1cc to see how I would react to it. It went in and I sipped the water. Didn't hurt like last week, but just sat there in the middle of my chest and sorta gurgled. Really uncomfortable, but painless. I took some more tiny sips and the nurses (2 of them) thought that perhaps the dr. should remove a half a cc. I didn't want to lose any of the fill, but also did not want to be too tight. Luckily my dr. is a very calm and patient individual. He calmed me down by just explaining what was happening,and why. He asked me to stay at the clinic for about a half hour. Just walk around and see how I felt. If I did feel like I needed a slight unfill he would do it, but just relax for a while and see if I didn't feel better. He totally understood that I was really nervous after the episode last week and was very sympathetic. Long way around to say that I wish everyone had the same excellent care that I am receiving...from pre surgery clear through the fills. Not to say that this is easy, but with the right medical team helping you out, it makes it a lot better! We all deserve the very best of care and the right to have everything explained to us before we experience it first hand!! Keep searching until you find a facility where you can receive that level of care!!