I had my surgery 5 days ago (9/24/09) and everything went really nice. I had several positive surprises:

An excellent experience from Dr. Almanza. He has already done more than four hundred sleeves this year 2009. I met with two people who got the sleeve two days before me and five who had it done while in my recovery. He is also very calm and dedicated more than enough quality time to me, explaining everything.

The clinic was nice. No frills, but nice. It's like a mini hospital, with one operating room and four of five patient rooms. The nurses there (Maggie & Veronica) were very professional and nice to me. I spent two days at the clinic, and those are the hardest as you have some pain when you move your body from the laparoscopyc gases and so.

The guest house is a very good idea. Instead of going to a hotel, where I would have been hiding any signs of surgery, the common areas downstairs are an excellent way to spend the time, sharing experiences with other patients, and staffed with two persons, one cooking and taking care of everything and one nurse in care of your medications, cures, and anything you need.

The rooms are nice, and all of them with satellite tv.

Not to forget that they picked me up from San Diego airport, and there are always two brand new micro vans with driver at our service, driving us from the house to the x-ray facility or the clinic, and even went to do some shopping on the las day.

I speak Spanish, but most of the staff speaks English, and there is always someone around who speaks English. You have free phone to the US, and they are US customer oriented. Overall a very nice experience. I'll try to share some of the pictures I took they day after surgery and four days after surgery, with some friends at the guesthouse.

I updated some pics of me on the first days under my profile, superppp.

Soon there will come the before and after ones.

All the best

Francisco

Francisco, thank you so much for sharing your experience and pictures. I am glad everything went well for you.

Francisco, welcome to VST. Thank you for your story and I, too, am glad that your surgery went well and that you had a good experience.

thank you for your story and the pictures also. Keep posting results and feelings, I appreciate your time. Good luck!

Thanks to all for your warm welcome. Ten days after surgery, and I've already lost 18 Lbs. I am very pleased with this decision.

Now I am trying to adapt to new serving portions. My plate is smaller than my younger daughter :-)

18 pounds already, wow, you are doing fabulous!