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Bariatric Pal and Dr. Illan VSG Review

This is my 100% honest review. I will go over the good and the bad and my experience as it was through my eyes.

I hope this will help you make the most informed decision possible.

On May 31 2016 my husband and I were sleeved at Florence hospital in TJ, MX by Dr. Illan.
Stacey was at the airport on time to pick us up and was very kind, we crossed the boarder quickly and within 40 mins were at Florence hospital in TJ. The hospital looks terrible from the outside, it really could be redone to make patients a bit more comfortable upon arrival. The inside of the hospital is very clean. My husband and I were shown to our room and right away nurses were getting our IV's in and our medical histories done. My surgery started about 3pm and was done within half an hour.
My husband mentioned when they moved me into the recovery area that my removed stomach was on the tray in the same room as him before they put him in the operating room. I don't think this was very sanitary.

Over all the doctor did a great job on our surgeries and we are healing up nicely.

After our surgeries back in the hospital room nurses were in and out constantly any time we hit the call button someone was there within 2 mins. I had a hard time sleeping the first night and Louis one of the BP staff stayed in the room talking to me all night which was great and helpful.

That night one of my bandages started to come off and when the nurse replaced that and re-taped my IV she wasn't wearing gloves. I mentioned this to Bill via a FB message and he said " They always use hand sanitizer that they have at the nurses station before entering the patients room. But I will bring it up to the hospital administrator." That's fine and dandy but still not 100% sanitary.
After we were discharged from the hospital Stacy took us to the recovery house and Juanito took us out. He was a great tour guide and showed us around town. The nurse at the recovery house is a sweetheart and does her best with her limited English, over all though she was just fantastic. The housekeeper at the recovery house was great too!

I do have a few issues with BP and have sent Alex an email addressing them. They are the following:
Stacy their "nutritionist" doesn't have a degree in nutrition, she is an engineer by trade. She is also the wife of Bill who is the administrator of BP. She is apparently going to school to be a nutritionist but still has quite some time ( 6 months at least) until she is done. She has had VSG though.
The post OP liquid diet it said we could eat beans and eggs..... nobody mentioned anything until I asked about that because from what I know neither of those things are a liquid. That is a potentially life threatening issue, if someone where to eat those things on a newly formed sleeve it could cause a leak or worse, when I asked her why it said that we could have those she said she was aware of the issue and was working on updating the paperwork.. yet I had the paperwork for over 24 hours before anyone told me that I couldn't have those things..... 3. Juanito, while fun and a great tour guide was at times unprofessional not only was his language colorful and unprofessional he was bad mouthing that patient in recovery house 1 because according to Juanito, the patient, was "strange" and didn't want to do anything and because his wife was odd as well. Apparently the patient and his wife were fighting and that annoyed Juanito 4. Juanito, also said to my husband and I that we were too young to have needed the surgery, called us lazy he said we could have just worked out to lose the weight. Whether or not that is true its none of his damn business. We paid over $9000.00 using bariatric pal along with flights and food and I cannot say I would do it again, I also wouldn't recommend it to anyone else. I feel there are serious issues that need to be worked out before I would recommend BP to another person. I would though recommend Dr. Illan to anyone.

I did do a video recommending BP and have since requested it be removed as a majority of these issues happened AFTER the video was made.

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  • Alex Brecher
    Alex Brecher

    Stephanie, Dr. Illan will be responding to the specific OR issues you brought up. I genuinely appreciate the constructive criticism and we will be dealing with everything head on. We've schedul

  • I appreciate everyones responses and this helps me feel a lot better about BP. Thanks everyone!

  • I am considering the sleeve in Mexico. But have many ? If you trust the water, how can you feel safe about the surgery? What about unexpected problems after I return to the US? I will not be able to

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Stephanie,

Dr. Illan will be responding to the specific OR issues you brought up.

I genuinely appreciate the constructive criticism and we will be dealing with everything head on.

We've scheduled a meeting with the head of nursing and the hospital administrator tomorrow to deal with the nurses not wearing gloves at all times.

Stacy isn't advertised as a nutritionist. She is finishing up her degree and should be certified shortly. You definitely should not be eating beans and eggs during your Stage 1 liquid diet phase. You'll be receiving an updated diet you can follow shortly which follows the normal dietary guidelines after gastric sleeve surgery.

Patients have always had very positive things to say about Juanito. I trust what you're saying and I really almost fell off my chair when I heard what he said to you and about the other people staying at the condos. It was extremely unacceptable and insensitive! Juanito has been let go and will no longer be dealing with our patients.

I will ask Bill to take down your video.

This is my 100% honest review. I will go over the good and the bad and my experience as it was through my eyes.

 

I hope this will help you make the most informed decision possible.

 

On May 31 2016 my husband and I were sleeved at Florence hospital in TJ, MX by Dr. Illan.

Stacey was at the airport on time to pick us up and was very kind, we crossed the boarder quickly and within 40 mins were at Florence hospital in TJ. The hospital looks terrible from the outside, it really could be redone to make patients a bit more comfortable upon arrival. The inside of the hospital is very clean. My husband and I were shown to our room and right away nurses were getting our IV's in and our medical histories done. My surgery started about 3pm and was done within half an hour.

My husband mentioned when they moved me into the recovery area that my removed stomach was on the tray in the same room as him before they put him in the operating room. I don't think this was very sanitary.

Over all the doctor did a great job on our surgeries and we are healing up nicely.

After our surgeries back in the hospital room nurses were in and out constantly any time we hit the call button someone was there within 2 mins. I had a hard time sleeping the first night and Louis one of the BP staff stayed in the room talking to me all night which was great and helpful.

That night one of my bandages started to come off and when the nurse replaced that and re-taped my IV she wasn't wearing gloves. I mentioned this to Bill via a FB message and he said " They always use hand sanitizer that they have at the nurses station before entering the patients room. But I will bring it up to the hospital administrator." That's fine and dandy but still not 100% sanitary.

After we were discharged from the hospital Stacy took us to the recovery house and Juanito took us out. He was a great tour guide and showed us around town. The nurse at the recovery house is a sweetheart and does her best with her limited English, over all though she was just fantastic. The housekeeper at the recovery house was great too!

I do have a few issues with BP and have sent Alex an email addressing them. They are the following:

Stacy their "nutritionist" doesn't have a degree in nutrition, she is an engineer by trade. She is also the wife of Bill who is the administrator of BP. She is apparently going to school to be a nutritionist but still has quite some time ( 6 months at least) until she is done. She has had VSG though.

The post OP liquid diet it said we could eat beans and eggs..... nobody mentioned anything until I asked about that because from what I know neither of those things are a liquid. That is a potentially life threatening issue, if someone where to eat those things on a newly formed sleeve it could cause a leak or worse, when I asked her why it said that we could have those she said she was aware of the issue and was working on updating the paperwork.. yet I had the paperwork for over 24 hours before anyone told me that I couldn't have those things..... 3. Juanito, while fun and a great tour guide was at times unprofessional not only was his language colorful and unprofessional he was bad mouthing that patient in recovery house 1 because according to Juanito, the patient, was "strange" and didn't want to do anything and because his wife was odd as well. Apparently the patient and his wife were fighting and that annoyed Juanito 4. Juanito, also said to my husband and I that we were too young to have needed the surgery, called us lazy he said we could have just worked out to lose the weight. Whether or not that is true its none of his damn business. We paid over $9000.00 using bariatric pal along with flights and food and I cannot say I would do it again, I also wouldn't recommend it to anyone else. I feel there are serious issues that need to be worked out before I would recommend BP to another person. I would though recommend Dr. Illan to anyone.

 

I did do a video recommending BP and have since requested it be removed as a majority of these issues happened AFTER the video was made.

Hi DuckieXD

 

I wanted to address your comments about the surgical operating room. The standards we follow are the same international guidelines set forth by hospitals all over the world including the U. S. We do apologize for your husband seeing the stomach that was removed but I can assure you the operating room was sterilized and disinfected prior to his surgery or I myself would not do surgery in it. My top priority is my patients health and safety!!

We are addressing the other issues that were mentioned about the nursing staff and do apologize once again.

 

 

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using the BariatricPal App

  • Author

I appreciate everyones responses and this helps me feel a lot better about BP. Thanks everyone!

I am considering the sleeve in Mexico. But have many ? If you trust the water, how can you feel safe about the surgery? What about unexpected problems after I return to the US? I will not be able to return should problems arise. Who will take care of my after care? The more I think about having surgery in Mexico the more ? I have.

Sent from my SM-G930T1 using the BariatricPal App

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