Hi everyone,

I'm just wondering if anyone has any positive experiences with CIBO? I really need to know as I am running out of options at another clinc (financial options):biggrin:. I would appreciate all input ...especially from those who have been banded there.

Thanks!

Hi Seana: I appreciate your comment about not wanting to debate, but if you are going to recommend a particular clinic or doctor it would be helpful for people making a search for comparisons if you stated what the clinic had to offer for aftercare. Aftercare is so vital to any decision being made due to all the possibilities that can go wrong. What is their support system if any. Doddie.

I did not come on here to dispute which clinic is better than the other. I wanted to let people know there are other options in the GTA other than the 2 clinics you mentioned. I realize the price is a bit higher than the other clinics. I paid $18,000.00, but the pre and post care have been fabulous!! I would recommend CIBO to anyone!!

Without ruffling your feathers here, you have been banded less than 1 month so I'd hardly call any post op care they have given you to date much to go on to so highly recommend them. I somehow feel you are probably one of their own employees pretending to be a real patient just to promote their own clinic. Nobody else has had anything but negative experiences and you come out with a stellar review for them. Something stinks here!!:biggrin:

Donna (looking around sideways and up and down :biggrin:) I see alot of feathers flying around! Yep Jane the cynic in me was thinking the same thing...

Just so you all know I do not work for the clinic! I have my own business which keeps me busy enough. The after care I have recieved thus far has been over what I expected. I met with the nutritionist, the physcologist and the Doctor one week after banding. The clinc has called me on many occations to check on me as did the nutritionist. As for the clinic not having a track record well my aunt works for Dr. Misra in St Joes. If she cant let me know her track record, I dont know who could??? Im not the only lady that was banded that day there were 4 of us. Its sad that people have to be so negative, we are all in this together. I got the surgey for the same reason you all did. I might have gone somewhere other than the 2 major clinics in Toronto, but that dosent mean ones better than the other. My clinc is just new, like yours was at some point. Like I said at the beginning I did not come on here to dispute what clinic is the best. The question being asked was had anyone been to CIBO? BTW it take a lot to ruffle these big feathers!!!:thumbup:

Seana no need to stick your tongue out unless you wish to catch flies! :biggrin2: My only issue with Dr. Misra is that she has done very few lapband surgeries. Yes she has done laprascopical surgeries but I am talking about lapband surgeries. It is only natural for new lapband clinics to be scrutinized due to the level of care needed by lapbanders to be successful. Glad you are happy with your level of aftercare so far and hope you continue to be down the road for your sake. As my clinic only charges $16,000 and has a proven track record and excellent aftercare I would expect a brand new clinic charging $2,000 more to expect extra scrutiny.

Just so you all know I do not work for the clinic! I have my own business which keeps me busy enough. The after care I have recieved thus far has been over what I expected. I met with the nutritionist, the physcologist and the Doctor one week after banding. The clinc has called me on many occations to check on me as did the nutritionist. As for the clinic not having a track record well my aunt works for Dr. Misra in St Joes. If she cant let me know her track record, I dont know who could??? Im not the only lady that was banded that day there were 4 of us. Its sad that people have to be so negative, we are all in this together. I got the surgey for the same reason you all did. I might have gone somewhere other than the 2 major clinics in Toronto, but that dosent mean ones better than the other. My clinc is just new, like yours was at some point. Like I said at the beginning I did not come on here to dispute what clinic is the best. The question being asked was had anyone been to CIBO? BTW it take a lot to ruffle these big feathers!!!:shades_smile:

Seena,

you may be the only person they call back, a friend of mine called to get details and they never would call her back she left tons of messages. So she went with where I recommended.

I agree with the others about the post op, your immediate post op sounds good and hope it continues for you. You can do the whole experience without it, hell I did but it is harder. My only worry seriously is can Toronto support 4-5 clinics. Two are big but there are several others and if CIBO goes under what will you do? I have an agreement from Scarborough Grace that they will always support the bandsters done at the same time and I know I can see my band surgeon in his office outside of the clinic so I know he will be there for me.

In my experience wait and see what happens as you start to lose and are 6-12 months out and hope the support is still there for you as well as the clinic. I have heard rumours they lost their funding to build. I have no idea if this is

true but i have friends in the medical community and when we were talking about it the other day they we saying what they were hearing is CIBO may not be around for very long. Again it is a rumour and take it with a huge grain of salt.. but I hope for your sake it stays around.

Good luck

Being the ever so cynical b**** that I am known to be. I say they will be done before the end of 2008. I've heard nothing good about them. They don't even have surgical suites of their own. I'll reserve my opinion about the founder's own weight loss journey from how many years out now? HMMMMM makes me wonder that's for sure. I took a chance going to SWLC being only the 50th or so patient but they had a track record and their price was lower because they were new. The price wasn't my deciding factor but I"m sure it was many people's. A new clinic opens and charges 2k more for something that other clinics(at least 4) have a proven history to their patients. I can't see why anyone in their right mind would even take the chance. First they have no surgical suite, they are working out of an office that isn't theirs, they don't return calls or emails from everything we have read from actual patients who have dealt with them. If you are the exception to the rule, congrats to you but this is the first anyone has had anything good to say about them. A friend was willing to book with them and they told her no surgical suites but we can do it elsewhere and would not even tell her where it would be. Okay so let's hide the fact where they were doing them, no wonder she ran fast and told them to shove it. It's all way too conspiracy like that they want almost 20k but wont tell you where they are going to operate on you. That's insane!!!

But good luck to you. :shades_smile:

The fact you were related to a staff member might be the reason you have had such good success with CIBO. It isn't what you know it is who you know. Just a thought. Doddie

Seana,

Congratulations on your surgery. I'm glad everything worked out and I wish you all the best with CIBO. I too went to see Dr. Misra at St. Josephs and I really liked her. I do believe she is a good surgeon and would not have hesitated to have her do my surgery. However, the CIBO clinic was just too far for me to travel for my follow-ups. I know that CIBO is a new clinic, a fact that they never tried to hide. I did not like the fact that it was in an office building and not a clinic on it's own. The people there (Tom and Nisrene) were very nice and treated me well. However, it was me that they would not give the name of the hospital to, something which concerned me greatly. I know that the cost of surgery is $18,000., the same as TLBC in Toronto (yes, TLBC raised their prices to anyone who is wondering).

I also heard (from people on this board) that they never met their surgeons until the day of surgery at TLBC. I wasn't impressed with that either, but perhaps I misunderstood the post.

My surgery is scheduled with Dr. Mumford at SWLC for April 24. This decision was based mainly on the location of the clinic and the cost. After all, $2,000 is $2,000 and SWLC is an established clinic and much closer to Hamilton. I met with Dr. Mumford and found him to be very informative.

This is a big decision for each person and I'm sure you made your decision based on the information given to you. I'm sure it will all work out and I hope CIBO is around for a long time.

I feel like the people on this board are close friends with each other and not open to outsiders joining in. Therefore, I won't be posting anything futher here. Good luck to you all.

From my point of view, I am very open to input from others and I am not a close friend to the others posting. I post negatives to give people the opportunity to see both sides. These negatives are my personal experiences. It is better to have the negatives up front before surgery than after. I didn't have that when I was making my decision. By withdrawing from posting you are making yourself feel better maybe, but you are not helping other potential banders make an informed decision. No need to get your back up because others support their clinics with zeal. The trick is to digest what their message is and make an informed decision based on research. Doddie

I am a happy bandster of the SWLC but I do believe that Dr Yau at the TLBC will meet with a perspective patient if the patient so requests it. I met Dr. Yau at the last Bandster Bash in May/07, and I have to admit I was blown away by the awesome speech he gave at our round table talk when it was his turn. He was discussing that we shouldn't feel ashamed at having a tool for dealing with our obesity and I was almost tempted to fully come out of the closet after hearing him speak to us. Mind you I stepped half back in the closet within a few hours of that but he is an amazing speaker and I was very impressed. Mind you my surgeon Dr Chris Cobourn at the SWLC is still number 1 in my books!

As for the people here being a tight community I suppose that is only natural when they participate regularly supporting each other. I don't post here too often though I know many here from other sites but I too tend to feel the outsider here, but it's just human nature to bond with some.

If you would ever like to come to the new support group I have started for SWLC patients in Mississauga please feel free to attend you will be very much welcomed. This is only our 3rd support meeting coming up this Thursday night on the 20th, and there is new members joining each month. Best wishes on your surgery in April with Dr Mumford he is a wonderful surgeon. I had the pleasure of having him phone me when a new friend was here from BC being banded last March and he gave me a full report of how she was doing (with her permission of course.)

PStevens, you are not the only person they would not divulge information to about their location. A friend of mine was in contact with them as well and she was told the same thing. She was also told that she'd only get to meet a surgeon once she put a downpayment and made a commitment to their clinic. I'm not so sure that everyone on here are friends either. I know 2 people from this board real life and I know a few others only from their posts on other groups I belong to. I just think we all have everyone's best interest at heart and when you hear stories like you experienced and like my friend experienced it really puts the red flags up. We all want everyone to succeed in their journey no matter where they go to get banded but you still want people to be cautious when someone new starts performing surgeries. You will love SWLC's staff, they have been nothing but wonderful to me. I met Dr. Yau long before TLBC ever existed and I thought he was wonderful as well. I actually was going to get him to band me but by the time I had made up my mind to have the surgery, he was at TLBC and I couldn't locate him since I had seen him pre-TLBC days and I started searching for another surgeon and found Dr. Cobourn. I thought he was wonderful from Day 1 just as I thought Dr. Yau was. By the time I found out Dr. Yau was at TLBC, I had already committed to Dr. Cobourn and don't regret my choice one bit. I think both clinics are wonderful and give excellent service to their patients. I'm still very apprehensive about CIBO only because of the experience my friend had and then seeing you had the same experience.

I think it's human nature to support where you had your surgery done. And yes, people need to make informed decisions. But, I felt under attack when I first posted that I had been to CIBO and I've watched the posts ever since. There seems to be a real hatred of this clinic and I don't understand it. Yes, it's a new clinic, but TLBC and SWLC were new clinics at one point also. I think there is more here than meets the eye.

I guess my point is, I have enough stress right now trying to get through the next six weeks. I certainly don't want to make someone else feel bad for their decision. I don't think that's fair. If this is a support group, we should support people, no matter where they have their surgery. Not make them worry about their clinic closing in the near future!

I know that the written word can be misinterpreted and perhaps that's what's happened with the posts on this thread. Maybe I'm just reading them wrong?

Donna,

Thanks for your invitation. As I get closer to my surgery, I might just need some support. SWLC has a website, much like this one and I have found it very useful as well.

I go for my pre-op appointment next week and start the liquid diet on April 3rd. I'm very nervous about the whole thing and I think we all need help through it.

I'm certainly not here to upset anyone.

There are many wonderful places for bandsters for support and information. My favourites are swlc forum and canadian yahoo group for bandsters. They are a lot more active than this one.