so done with it all

Have you two registered over at the SWLC forum where you can talk to other patients of the clinic who have been banded forever? Not many of us hang out on lapbandtalk any longer so you may get a lot more support over there. Just a suggestion as you are both very new to banding.

I've been banded for years and .5cc is far from a joke. I have noticed huge differences with as little as .1cc They usually top you up to 4cc on your first fill as some will have 3cc and other 3.5 cc in there from the prime at time of surgery and then they usually take you up to 4cc. After that you go slow. Trust me you do not want to be too tight. I'd sooner get 2 fills then to put up with being too tight for even 1 day. Been there done that and it's not fun when you can't even keep Water down or it takes you hours to even get 4 oz of Fluid in. Polly not sure where you are but if you are 7 hours from Sudbury, are you closer to Timmins? We have a fill nurse here affiliated with SWLC and she has been doing my fills for years and is very good at them.

I had my TT with Dr. Lista. He has his practice in the same office as SWLC and is very famiilar with band patients.

If you live in Canada then it's not covered by most provincial healthcares. Most people pay for it the same way they would pay for a car, borrow the money, take it out of their RRSP, borrow from a family member, etc.

I don't believe Slimband uses the Allergan Lap-band but you would have to ask them to be positive. They were using other bands at one time.

Lap-band is the trademarked name of the Allergan band. Slimband is the name of a clinic.

If you are interested in the Lap-Band, you may want to attend the 3rd annual SWLC Symposium. It’s open to guests and you don’t have to be banded to attend. It’s a full day of educational and inspirational sessions from experts in the weight loss field. It’s a great opportunity to hear patient stories and meet with other members of the Lap-Band community. Registration includes breakfast, lunch buffet, cocktail reception, gift bags and door prizes. The Symposium will take place on Saturday, May 15th 2010 at the Sheraton Toronto Airport Hotel & Conference Centre located at 801 Dixon Road in Toronto. Tickets are $100 per person. If you would like to register please click on the link below: http://www.obesitysurgery.ca/contact-us/symposium-2010-registration-form.php Hope to see you there.

SWLC offers a lifetime of after care and fills/defills and have fill doc/nurse in NL.

I claimed mine as a medical expense and had no issues at all. They may ask for the receipt but that's about it.

Their fill doctors are for their patients only. They are not going to give out proprietary information to non patients.

Most of the people that used to post here from SWLC are now posting at the clinic's message forum. If you aren't a member there, you should join and then you can see if anyone wants to get together. Lapband, Gastric Balloon & Weight Loss Surgery | SWLC - Surgical Weight Loss Centre Forum •

I had it last spring and we thought perhaps I was too tight but it turned out I had a huge hiatus hernia. I tried a defill first but that didn't work so the doctor did a barium swallow and it was a hiatus hernia. Are you not eating or drinking hours before bed so everything has time to pass through to the lower stomach?

In Ontario, tummy tucks are not covered. They will sometimes cover what is called a panniculectomy. It's strictly the excess skin from the belly button down. There is no suturing of the muscles or moving the belly button. It's strictly chopping off the excess. The problem in Ontario with this is that very few plastic surgeons will work with OHIP and many will not do it unless you pay the difference for a full tummy tuck. The PS here has to make a case to OHIP to have it covered such as documented rashes etc. I've not heard of other provinces covering it but I know for a fact that it's not in Ontario.

Lila, I'm not from Winnipeg but have you contacted your original banding clinic to see if they have a new fill person for your area? Our local fill nurse recently quit but the clinic lined up another and I just had to ask for them to put me in touch with her. It might be a start for you if you haven't done that already.

Cando, I believe all those that replied to you were banded outside of Canada given their replies. Things are done very differently outside of Canada then they are here. You really have to be careful as to how you word things perhaps. I think you should be asking the clinics that you are interested in going to, what their post op follow up includes instead of calling it a warranty. I was banded at SWLC 4 years ago and I have unlimited lifetime access to post op support and follow up. I had to have my band replaced earlier this year and everything was covered. I don't live in the GTA so I get my fills locally from a fill nurse that the SWLC has trained to do their patients. Yes I pay her but then I don't have to travel to the clinic so I save 2 days of travel, loss wages, all traveling expenses so it's worth it to me. I know of all 4 of the clinics you are interested in going to. Don't let the price alone sway you one way or the other. Make sure you know exactly what you are getting for your money. I am super happy with the care I have been given at SWLC and continue to get from them. I can't speak for the other 3 since I didn't go there but just make sure you really do your homework before deciding. Many of the clinics offer free consultations so you could do that. I know that SWLC will do telephone consults for those that live out of town and your consultation is with one of the surgeons so you get to ask all your questions directly to the person who is performing the surgery. Good luck with your decision to choose the best clinic to suit your needs.

Here is Hanbe's profile. You could private message her and ask her for the name. I found the comment she made but it's in a 10 page thread so best to just message her. LOL http://www.lapbandtalk.com/members/54959.html

There's a user on here named Hanbe that had once posted that she knows of a fill nurse and for anyone to contact her if they needed a fill/defill. I can't find her post right now but if I do, I'll post the link for you. Lapband is not covered by insurance here so we all end up self paying and the clinics are private and usually only service their own clients since they have lots of them. And if they take on a patient from a different surgeon, they then become responsible for them for more than their fills according to how our health laws work here. It might seem like they are penalizing you but really it's just a very different system and nothing more.

We don't have fill centres in Canada like you do in the States. You could contact some of the clinics that do bands in Toronto and see if they will take you on as a patient but it might be costly. They won't just do 1 fill like the fill centres do, they sell you a whole package usually if they will even take you on. There is TLBC/Slimband, SWLC, CIBO and one at Humber River Hospital. It's worth a call to find out what they could do for you if anything.

Lapband is not covered by OHIP. They cover other types of WLS but lapband is excluded.

I think you might be correct here. Most surgeons only count the ones they actually perform not sit in on or assist.

I'd love to know how she has come up with 700 lapbands done considering they've only been open a year or so. I was banded at SWLC and they have done over 2000 in 4 years and they are super busy and operate 5 days a week. There's only a handful of their patients that ever post and you'd think if she had done 700, there would be more posting not just a half dozen or so. I belong to numerous bandster sites and her name seldom comes up as anyone's surgeon.

SWLC is very much like this one. It has threads just like this one but it's broken into categories. Very user friendly.

There are tons of Toronto people banded, they just don't use this website any longer. Most use their own clinic's websites now. This one and the yahoo group have really died down in the past 2 years.

There's a monthly support meeting for patients of the SWLC in Mississauga. It's posted in the support group section on the SWLC website. There are also monthly bandster luncheons all over the GTA for patients from all clinics. I"m not sure if they still post the luncheons on here or not but you could join the yahoo group called Canadian Lapbanders if you are interested in attending those.

I'll be there for sure and will attend the dinner with all the others on Friday night as well. Can't wait for it.