Angel B.

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My original surgery was paid for by medicaid.  My revision was paid for my Medicare with medicaid picking up any "extras".  I know that revisions cost more that a virgin stomach, and medicare pays the same either way.  I was fortunate to have a surgeon for my revision that really cares & wanted to help me.  He knew that the first surgery was a failure due to no fault of my own.

My original surgery was in June 2005. It was a proximal RNY.  Within a few weeks I knew there was a problem and started to question my surgeon about why I wasnt losing and how I never got sick & could eat anything.  Well that went on for months & finally through a friend I got into see my new surgeon.  He said that yes something is wrong but he needed to do some tests.  That took a few months more to have an upper GI and an Endoscopy.  He concluded that my surgery was a failure do to the fact that I had a stitcher..? basically my stomach & pouch had grown back together, & that the pouch was "huge"  & that I couldnt have done all of that myself in such a short period of time.  Sooo, he scheduled me for a revision in August of 2006.  Which was months later but we both had conflicting schedules.  Anyhow the week before surgery, we all found out that Medicare now requires all hospitals that preform gastric bypass to have a "certification of excellence"  so I was postponed again until my hospital got that certification.  Luckily for me they were already in the process ohterwise it can take YEARS.  So now I am about 6-7 weeks post op from the revision.  & Doing well.  The revision is still an RNY.  He bypassed 4 more feet of intestine and removed my pouch and created a smaller one.  So some of it was actually thrown away..  I also had 3 huge hernias when he went in, so that was a huge consideration going for such a major surgery again.