So i thought i'd do a mini roll call. So how many people here are from the Huntsville Area?

It appears he is changing his mind about it.

I am so glad to hear this! There are so many people who want this option! How are you doing post surgery??

Wow, that's very different than his seminar in July. He called gastric bypass the "Gold Standard".

Most of the questions at his seminar were about lapband though, even after spending an hour trying to convince people against it.

I tried to get surgery with Dr Foreman from July until end of October. They are so so so so so ignorant on insurance issues and Tricare.

I got denied 2 times even though I MORE than qualify with Dr Foreman.

Dr Malapur seemed to be a whiz with insurance issues though..

I finally moved to Colorado Springs.

Edited December 1, 200817 yr by sunnylilme

Thanks for the warm welcome and info on Dr. Mailapur. It sounds like he is finally warming up to the lap-band. Since I'm pretty much a perfect candidate for it, he would be hard-pressed to find an argument against me getting it. I'm going to his seminar on December 9, then I get to start the fun hoop-jumping process for BCBS.

I meant he called Gastric Bypass the Gold standard...oops.

I am doing much better, thanks for asking. I did not do so well in recovery and had to stay overnight.

Congrats on getting banded! Glad to know you're doing better now. If you don't mind me asking, why did they decide to keep you overnight? I am concerned that I might have some complications due to past experiences. I have had surgery twice in the past, and both times, I experienced gratuitous vomiting almost immediately after coming out of the anesthesia. I imagine that's not the best outcome for someone who is essentially having stomach surgery. I'm told that it was a reaction to demerol, but I don't know what that really is, or if it's necessary during surgery.

Marshall, Co

Arab, Al

Dr. Britt did my surgery on 11/25 of this year.

Joan

Marshall, Co

Arab, Al

Dr. Britt did my surgery on 11/25 of this year.

Joan

congrats on being banded recently. How are you feeling?

I am feeling great. I am just tired of the liquid diet. I am ready to eat something. I go back in two day and I hope I will be upgraded.

Joan

Anyone going to the support group meeting tonight? Sounds like it's going to be a great one but not sure if I'm going yet or not.

Hello Saved... I am still debating about going. I am sooooooo cold. Also I am sore from work today. I might take a pain pill and get knocked out! I just don't no yet. If you go have fun.

Morphine could definitely cause vomiting if you're not use to pain meds. Any of them could actually, but I believe morphine is the strongest!

Demoral is what they gave me too, but they would come inject me every 4 hours if I bugged the nurse..they did it right into my IV and it never lasted long enough, so one of the night nurses told me if he injects it in my thigh it takes longer to get out of my system, and I went that route for the night.

I was held overnight because that's Dr. Freeman's policy..

Well, I went to Dr. Mailapur's seminar on Tuesday night. My husband went with me for moral support. It was at the Dowdle Center across from Huntsville Hospital. It was really easy to find and we had no problem getting in and finding the room. I already had all 9 pages of paperwork filled out and ready to hand in. We ended up getting there way too early, but I definitely didn't want to be late! I wanted to be the nerd in the front row. :rolleyes2: It turns out that I had no competition for the front row after all. What is it with people always wanting to sit in the back?

Apparently the doctor was running late, so his office manager got up and started the seminar with all the insurance info we needed to know. The good thing is that his office pretty much takes over your paperwork for you. All you have to do is provide the details. When you've met all the requirements on their checklist, they submit it to BCBS online and have an answer within hours. Pretty cool. The uncool part? He requires $200 (cash or credit card only) upfront for the consultation appointment. This was stressed several times, and is most certainly NOT refundable. :cursing: For that price, I'd better get a FULL HOUR of undivided attention. And a cookie.

The doctor showed up 20 minutes later and flew through a Powerpoint presentation about the various means of bariatric surgery. A lot of the presentation was statistics and quotes from medical journals in support of surgery. I thought that was just fluff, considering most of the people who took time out of their lives on a weeknight for this seminar had already decided to look seriously at a surgical option. He had about 3 slides on lap-band and its pros and cons. Then he got to "The Gold Standard" slide i.e. gastric bypass, and spent the rest of the presentation on that. I'd say there were at least 10 slides on gastric bypass. It is obviously his preferred method.

We had a pretty shy crowd, and I didn't want to seem like I was monopolizing his time by asking a bunch of questions. I had already asked several questions when the office manager was doing her spiel. Plus, he didn't really seem like he wanted to commit to an answer for anyone, which I can understand, because every case is different. There was at least one other young couple in the audience, so I wanted to ask a question that might benefit them too. So I asked how he felt about someone my age who wanted to have kids in the next couple of years getting a lap-band. He dodged the question by saying he's had plenty of patients who got gastric bypass and had kids. I told him that was too permanent for someone my age. He said something to the effect of "whatever" and moved on to the next question. Sigh. Really makes me look forward to the office visit.

Overall I feel like the seminar was kind of a waste of my time, considering all the information I already found on my own. I had to wait two weeks for the seminar to roll around, which is two weeks sooner that I could have been working on the 6-month program. Considering you have to attend the seminar before you can even walk in the door, I think it was really designed to cut out the riffraff from filling up his appointment books then never going through with the surgery. It's a sound business decision, but it inconveniences everyone to stop the few who cause him problems. Just my opinion though.

I went ahead and made an appointment for next week when my husband can come with me. If I'm going to have a battle, at least I'll have reinforcements. I'm hoping that he is better to talk to in a one-on-one environment, though. I don't want to have to fight tooth-and-nail for something I know is right for me. I'll let you all know how it goes...

Will your insurance cover Dr. Groves? He is from Albertville but comes to Madison once a month. He did my surgury and I love him. He also has the band. If you want more information pm me and I will give you the info. Good luck.

I have BCBS of Alabama and I used Dr. Britt/Dr. Groves for my surgery. I did drive to Guntersville and Marshall Medical Center North for the surgery. It was worth the trip. I love Dr. Britt. They are now doing Lap-Band surgeries two days a week at Marshall Medical North. 90% of their surgeries are the Lap-Band. In their practice, the bypass is falling to the side in favor of the better procedure.

Thanks for the recommendations on alternate doctors! Depending on how my appointment with Dr. Mailapur goes this week, I may follow up with you folks.

Queenvaruk, I'm sorry if my criticism of the seminar caused offense. It was totally not my intention. I wanted to document my impressions of the seminar for other people who may be starting out, so they would know what to (or not to) expect. It was based on my doctor's and your recommendation that I decided to give Dr. Mailapur a try. I value your experience, and it has been encouraging to me.

I have thought about it quite a bit over the last few days, and I think several factors contributed to my negative feelings about the seminar. 1) The doctor showed up over 20 minutes late. Not a good first impression. 2) The $200 fee was stressed over and over again, but was never explained as an industry standard. I think a better explanation yould have made it easier to swallow, and seem less pretentious. 3) The doctor blew my question off in front of a lot of other people, who were probably interested in the answer. It gave me the impression that he is not interested in the patient's opinion or input. 4) The information given in the seminar was mostly a sales pitch for bariatric surgery, and was nothing more than what I had already gathered from this site and others like it.

I'm a firm believer in second chances, so I'm chalking the experience up to a bad day. I'm going into the consultation with a positive attitude (and my credit card!!).