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I have an appointment with a bariatric surgeon next week. Does anyone have any experience with getting approved with Blue Cross of Illinois ? My BMI is 38 and I have recently torn my meniscus . My A1C is 6.2 so I’m not sure if they will approve me or not ?
Thanks

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I have BCBSIL and just went for my first appt. last week. From what I understand, you have to check that bariatric surgery is covered on your specific policy. If it is, a BMI between 35 and 40 requires you have other health issues such as diabetes or high blood pressure. Before I went to my appointment, the surgeons office checked my insurance coverage for me, which was very helpful.

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My *** plan covers 100% for BMI 40+. For BMI under 40, a person needs to have 2 well documented comorbidities. All surgery patients have to go through Psych evaluation, 3 months (4 appointments) of supervised medical weight loss, an upper endoscopy, visit with dietician, 2-3 weeks of liquid diet (dependent on BMI) and anything else that may come up (I had to see a vascular specialist because I have blood clotting disorders). I have done everything through my surgeon’s office - so easy and they are really nice. I am 2.5 months in on the supervised medical weight loss and having my endoscopy and dietician visit next month. Should be good for surgery in Sept or Oct, depending on COVID and the schedule of my surgeon (they had over 3,000 surgeries to reschedule after the first outbreak of COVID). I will submit to be approved once I complete everything. Hope this helps!

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I was at 39. It went thru pretty easy because I had a history of high A1c, borderline blood pressure, and sleep arena. None of the three were severe, but they still helped get it thru. The one issue I did have was they sit on the request for some time. I had to keep calling the MCM to get them to review my file in a timely manner.

Eddy Blaine Brown II

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    • Alisa_S

      On day 4 of the 2 week liquid pre-op diet. Surgery scheduled for June 11th.
      Soooo I am coming to a realization
      of something and I'm not sure what to do about it. For years the only thing I've enjoyed is eating. We rarely do anything or go anywhere and if we do it always includes food. Family comes over? Big family dinner! Go camping? Food! Take a short ride or trip? Food! Holiday? Food! Go out of town for a Dr appointment? Food! When we go to a new town we don't look for any attractions, we look for restaurants we haven't been to. Heck, I look forward to getting off work because that means it's almost supper time. Now that I'm drinking these pre-op shakes for breakfast, lunch, and supper I have nothing to look forward to.  And once I have surgery on June 11th it'll be more of the same shakes. Even after pureed stage, soft food stage, and finally regular food stage, it's going to be a drastic change for the rest of my life. I'm giving up the one thing that really brings me joy. Eating. How do you cope with that? What do you do to fill that void? Wow. Now I'm sad.
      · 1 reply
      1. LeighaTR

        I hope your surgery on Wednesday goes well. You will be able to do all sorts of new things as you find your new normal after surgery. I don't know this from experience yet, but I am seeing a lot of positive things from people who have had it done. Best of luck!

    • Alisa_S

      On day 4 of the 2 week liquid pre-op diet. Surgery scheduled for June 11th.
      Soooo I am coming to a realization
      of something and I'm not sure what to do about it. For years the only thing I've enjoyed is eating. We rarely do anything or go anywhere and if we do it always includes food. Family comes over? Big family dinner! Go camping? Food! Take a short ride or trip? Food! Holiday? Food! Go out of town for a Dr appointment? Food! When we go to a new town we don't look for any attractions, we look for restaurants we haven't been to. Heck, I look forward to getting off work because that means it's almost supper time. Now that I'm drinking these pre-op shakes for breakfast, lunch, and supper I have nothing to look forward to.  And once I have surgery on June 11th it'll be more of the same shakes. Even after pureed stage, soft food stage, and finally regular food stage, it's going to be a drastic change for the rest of my life. I'm giving up the one thing that really brings me joy. Eating. How do you cope with that? What do you do to fill that void? Wow. Now I'm sad.
      · 1 reply
      1. summerseeker

        Life as a big person had limited my life to what I knew I could manage to do each day. That was eat. I hadn't anything else to look forward to. So my eating choices were the best I could dream up. I planned the cooking in managable lots in my head and filled my day with and around it.

        Now I have a whole new big, bigger, biggest, best days ever. I am out there with those skinny people doing stuff i could never have dreamt of. Food is now an after thought. It doesn't consume my day. I still enjoy the good home cooked food but I eat smaller portions. I leave food on my plate when I am full. I can no longer hear my mother's voice saying eat it all up, ther are starving children in Africa who would want that!

        I still cook for family feasts, I love cooking. I still do holidays but I have changed from the All inclusive drinking and eating everything everyday kind to Self catering accommodation. This gives me the choice of cooking or eating out as I choose. I rarely drink anymore as I usually travel alone now and I feel I need to keep aware of my surroundings.

        I don't know at what point my life expanded, was it when I lost 100 pounds? Was it when I left my walking stick at home ? Was it when I said yes to an outing instead of finding an excuse to stay home ? i look back at my last five years and wonder how loosing weight has made such a difference. Be ready to amaze yourself.

        BTW, the liquid diet sucks, one more day and you are over the worst. You can do it.

    • CaseyP1011

      Officially here for a long time, not just a good time💪
      · 0 replies
      1. This update has no replies.
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