I was supposed to be three months nicotine free prior to surgery. I stopped smoking cold turkey two weeks ago. I don't have a date yet but they are submitting everything to my insurance soon. I am unsure if they will make me take the blood test before submitting everything to insurance?

I was a pack a day smoker, do you think three weeks quitting I will be ae to pass?

I had to do the same thing. I bought some test stips and tested all the time it took about a month for it to come clean. I do know they tested me the at preoperative 2 days before the surgery.

Best of luck you made it past 2 weeks you should be ok

?❤

I think I was tested again right before surgery, too (I am a former smoker, but I quit 25 years ago, so of course it wasn't an issue for me...)

7 hours ago, ImsexyandIknowit said:

I had to do the same thing. I bought some test stips and tested all the time it took about a month for it to come clean. I do know they tested me the at preoperative 2 days before the surgery.

Best of luck you made it past 2 weeks you should be ok

?❤

Did you have a blood test or urine test?

My surgery is May 19th and insurance has already been submitted and come back as approved. My office told me to get that test done by the end of this week.

1 hour ago, Shannahnagem said:

Did you have a blood test or urine test?

I want to say a urine test, I do not remember I will go back and look at my labs. If it was not a urine I will update my response

Good Luck :-)

It's interesting, I don't remember ever having discussed a nicotine test during my run-up to surgery. Maybe they did test me, but didn't bring it up as a discussion point because I said I had never smoked. I'm curious now.

I’m not a smoker, but I had a full drug panel done twice. Once on a comprehensive bloodwork and urine panel 2 months out, and then again in my pre op labs the week before surgery. Most doctors require this as it’s extremely counter productive to smoke or have drug use before major surgery.

I will paste this from WebMD.

“Generally, nicotine will leave your blood within 1 to 3 days after you stop using tobacco, and cotinine will be gone after 1 to 10 days. Neither nicotine nor cotinine will be detectable in your urine after 3 to 4 days of stopping tobacco products.Nov 9, 2020”


I have only seen the cotinine test used to rule out smoking before organ transplant. I work with pre-transplant patients and have never worked with WLS patients. I had quit smoking over 20 years ago and was not tested for either, but tomato—tomahto...I’m sure that some surgeons do test. I quit cold turkey > 20 years ago. In my mind I didn’t think of it as quitting. Total rationalization I know, but I told myself I wasn’t allowed to go into the gas station to buy cigs and that plus some nicotine gum after the 3 days (I was getting grumpy) did the trick. No smoking will help with improved healing and reduced risk of cancer. Quitting smoking while following WLS diet and restrictions will be hard. Some therapy and support groups might help. Be well and good luck to you.

I just had my nicotine tests today and it was a blood test.

They never mentioned nicotine to me, but I'm self pay. I don't smoke but I do vape nicotine.

1 hour ago, traceyingraphics@gmail.com said:

They never mentioned nicotine to me, but I'm self pay. I don't smoke but I do vape nicotine.

I don't think that would be an insurance requirement - more likely a surgeon requirement. Your surgeon must just not do it....

My insurance requires smoke free. I quit March 31st. Took my nicotine blood test May 1st. Waiting for results....all my or op requirements are completed. Once results come back, clinic will submit to insurance for approval!

On 4/22/2021 at 11:11 PM, Shannahnagem said:

I was supposed to be three months nicotine free prior to surgery. I stopped smoking cold turkey two weeks ago. I don't have a date yet but they are submitting everything to my insurance soon. I am unsure if they will make me take the blood test before submitting everything to insurance?

I was a pack a day smoker, do you think three weeks quitting I will be ae to pass?

I bought at home tests for nicotine on my last surgery, and I cleared by day 10. I vape constantly and before that I smoked for years. You can get them on Amazon.

They never mentioned nicotine to me, but I'm self pay. I don't smoke but I do vape nicotine.

I was also self pay, but they did do a nicotine test before surgery. I quit smoking 22 years ago though.

I smoke, and it took me about 1 month to finally not have it show up. With that being said doctor told me I needed to be 3 months clean on both cigarettes' and weed prior to my surgery.

that was very hard to do but I did it...I wanted this surgery REALLY REALLY bad.....