I haven't a ride home after surgery, and was thinking I'd drive myself to and from the surgery. Any thoughts on this?

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@@AvaFern is technically correct, but keep this in mind also: if you were to get into an accident on your way home, your insurance company has grounds to not pay any claim if you're within a certain number of hours of general anesthesia and you don't have a doctor's clearance to drive. So if you decide to 'not tell them', just know that you could be liable. It's not just about narcotics and anesthesia clearing your system, it's also about muscle weakness and fatigue which can reduce your reaction time/ability and put you at risk.

Please make every effort to find a better solution than a risky self-drive home.

Hospital shouldn't allow you to drive

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@@ShelterDog64

Actually no, your insurance company does not get to deny your claim if you did not violate any laws while you were driving. If that was the case they could deny claims for people because they hadn't had enough sleep, because they were older and weaker, because they had slow reaction time, because their IQ wasn't terribly high...and for a lot of other reasons that cause a substantial slippery slope and are not aligned with policy goals. If you are breaking no laws while driving, your insurance company does not get to refuse to pay a claim without making themselves enormously liable when you sue them. So, sure, they can try, but they would not be successful.

On another note though, if you injure someone else while driving and a reasonable person would not have thought it was acceptable to drive, then you can be found negligent, or worse, if a reasonable person thinks you disregarded a substantial risk, you can even be found reckless in your actions. If you kill someone while driving home and a jury believes that it was because you ignored your doctor's orders, thus knowing you were potentially endangering the lives of others and choosing to do it anyway, you can potentially be guilty of manslaughter.

So, @@ShelterDog64 has a very valid point in that if you drive home and you get in an accident you may have some problems. Your insurance company on their own is going to have a tough time denying your claim if you were legally fit to drive, but a negligence case against you has the potential to be successful. Short of killing someone, criminally you aren't breaking any laws, but in civil procedures, the standard to make you miserable is far lower than criminal.

So yes, you can drive home, but if you crash, you're potentially screwing yourself depending on exactly how you manage to crash.

So, my insurance company would pay my claim of injury, plus the other person's injury claim but would not protect me from being sued for physical harm? Good enough for me ????

Edit: Actually, if it's determined that you're under the influence of any narcotic or anesthetic agent, they will cover the damages to another person and their property, but your policy may limit their responsibility to you. It's a silly risk to take.

Regardless, bottom line is that unless you can squeeze more than 48 hours post-op and drug-free into your admission (unlikely for most of us), you're better off to get a ride/call a cab...this is major surgery.

Cab or uber...to dangerous to drive home..I was a little nauseated. On my discharge..So please be safe.

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I've talked to my friend from church, he has a key to my house. I'm going to leave my car keys in my apt and he will ride his bike over to get my car and pick me up, so i will be safe.

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@@sunnydeeliteful So happy you were able to find someone!

I wish I could! That means I wouldn't have to tell my mom. Who when I had the band I asked her to keep it quiet, then a few years post op I found out she told everyone .

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I've talked to my friend from church, he has a key to my house. I'm going to leave my car keys in my apt and he will ride his bike over to get my car and pick me up, so i will be safe.

Sent from my SM-G550T1 using the BariatricPal App

Perfect outcome