Hi, I was banded by Dr. Lopez in April of 2003. I love Dr. Lopez and I love my band. I found out last month that I have erosion and my band is being removed March 4th. I'm devastated about the news. I've lost 70 lbs and feel great. Many on Spotlight Health told me to come here and speak with others that were banded by Dr. Lopez and have had the band removed. I live in Las Vegas, NV so at least the traveling is not hard. Would like any information that anyone has regarding erosion or their experience with Dr. Lopez. I've heard he is one of the best surgerons for this surgery. Thank you to anyone who can reply.

Heidi

Heidi, best of luck to you! I'm so sorry to hear about this. 70 pounds - that is a wonderful loss! Have you tried the "search" feature at the top of the page? There are several posts here about erosions (not all of them are Dr. Lopez' patients). There are also several posts about Dr. Lopez. Where will you be having your band removed at?

I really screwed up by not coming to this websit for so long. I was banded in April 2003, lost 70 lbs and now having it removed with Dr. Lopez because of erosion. I had problems with Nora also.........never answering my messages, never returning calls, etc. I guess I was in my own bubble thinking it was just me complaining!

Also, glad to hear other people not happy with Dr. Fisher in Las Vegas. My uncle was banded with him, he has never been friendly and always puts him down during his visits. I've heard from many people he is very about himself and his patients can plainly see a "non caring" doctor. I think, at leat in my uncles case, he had no choice since insurance had approved him there.

I hope that Dr. Lopez had a bad batch of bands, I like him and would hate to find out he is doing something wrong. I was banded first, then my dad, then my aunt, and finally my sister. I am the only one so far with the erosion problem.

Thanks to all of you who take the time to give information. It really helps people like me who feel lost sometimes with knowing about my band, my doctor, etc.

I'm sorry to hear of your erosion

But as Marie said there is lots of useful info here on erosion and several posts about Lopez patients who have had success with him as a surgeon and some who have not who have had not ..I'm sure those who used Lopez will replyto your post.

Best of Luck to you

Sorry to hear about your erosion. I Hope the best for you.

Please inform Inamed of your erosion, maybe a bad batch of bands. It seems strange that Lopez has so many erosion cases.

I agreewith Vera, please contact Inamed to let them know of this

you can email Don Mills

don.mills@inamed.com

They like to hear of problems with their bands.

Sorry to hear of your erosion

I'm soory about your erison too! Like Vera said, I would definately report it so they can keep records. Please let us know how things go.

Hi Heidi -

Glad to see you found your way over here. Not sure why there seems to be a rash of Lopez erosions this past year and a half, but you make about the tenth one I know of personally, including myself.

I don't have too much to add in addition to the links I gave you, but if you need someone to talk to who understands feel free to email me - click on my name and choose "Send an email" - I usually respond to my email several times throughout the day.

(((hugs))), and wishing you all the best...

I met with Lopez last month and asked him flat out, "why do you have so many erosions?" He doesn't know. I asked if it could have been a bad batch of bands, but he wasn't able to answer. He told me that he asked Inamed how many he had the prior year, and they said zero.

Donali, Karen's Band was placed October 2003. Do you have a list of everyone, including their date of placement? Could it be a bad batch of bands? If so, that could mean a lot of people are walking around with erosion but don't know it yet. It would be interesting to see a chart.

My Lopez Band was placed May 2004, and there was no erosion as of last month.

Heidi, I'm here in Vegas. Let me know if there's anything you need... anything at all.

I Hate Fisher.

Per the guy I talked to at Inamed when reporting my erosion, it is virtually impossible to get the serial numbers from Lopez of the bands that have been placed, so tracking these things back to a bad batch of Inamed bands seems unlikely, although Inamed should have records of what was sent to Lopez, and I would imagine it could be guesstimated by the number of bandings he's done which batch they were done from, if he by chance used up one batch before starting the next.

I was banded 1/23/03 - so if it was a bad batch of bands it's spread out over a long period of time....

My erosion was diagnosed 6/17?/04 at 40%, removal two weeks later over the 4th of July weekend, 2004.

I have merged "Light Has Been Shed" with this thread to avoid duplication.

Heidi..how did you find out you had erosion? Who told you? Was it Lopez ? Did you have any symptoms to make you think something was wrong? Erosion is such a strange phenomenon, Im curious to know your situation if you do not mind sharing it with all of us..

Thanks again everyone for giving your support. I simply went to Mexico for a fill with my dad and sister. They got their fill and all was well, I went in for my fill and when I took the first swallow of Barium, the doctor and the nurse looked at the x-ray screen for awhile and then had me take another swallow, they then told me that something was wrong and at that time thought the band has slipped. When Dr. Lopez saw it on tape he announced to me that he was 99% sure it was erosion. I went for an endoscopy 2 weeks later, it did confirm that the band had almost made its way into my stomach completely.

I have no symptoms, I feel fine. I have a bit of restriction left just from the band being there. It will be removed on March 4th. I will let everyone know how the surgery went. I'm also getting a mini face lift while I'm getting the band removed. I did not want to have surgery and get nothing out of it! Thanks again for all the knowledge and support, you are all great people!

Will your stomach heal after your band was removed? Why did you not just have all of the Fluid removed, or is that not enough for the stomach to heal?

Will you have another band placed?

Kat, if you think about erosion (say for example on battery cables) then you'll see that the band has to be removed. It actually errodes into the stomach, so it has to be removed.

Some of my friends have had their bands removed due to erosion. Yes, the doctors will usually allow you to have a new band placed after you are healed (at your own expense.) But there's not a lot of research available yet to see if someone who had eroded once will erode with a 2nd band. It's a matter of personal choice to take another chance.