12-27-2003, 11:52 AM
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Pixies Den Mother
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Join Date: Mar 2002
Location: No-Hockey Land, dammit!!
Posts: 11,897
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Irish & Jenna,
My own doctor would not be the one to do the surgery. I would be sent to a clinic that specializes in the procedure. It would be up to them to evaluate me...to see if I'd be a good candidate or not, as well as whether or not our insurance would cover it. First step is to attend a seminar hosted by the clinic, after which they encourage us to talk to others that will be there that have already undergone the procedure. It's a long involved process getting approved for it.
I believe it is the same as what's referred to as "stomach stapling" but the intestines also get re-routed. This clinic also does the procedure laproscopically. It's much less invasive than the older one where you are cut from your breast bone down to the navel.
Lest anyone think I'm entering into this lightly....the current way of measuring whether or not one is a healthy weight is by one's BMI (Body Mass Index). A healthy BMI is approximately 25. Mine is nearly 60. This has long since ceased being a matter of cosmetics, it's a matter of health. Sometime in the future I will have to have open heart surgery. The weight I'm at now would make that more risky than normal. I need to improve my odds as much as possible.
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