About to lose insurance.

In the process of waiting for my doctor to give me a clean bill of health for me to have the wls surgery, my husband is changing jobs. That means we will have to change insurances. I have medicare in addition to my other insurance, but what if his insurance doesn't follow up with the approved surgery? Will Medicare pay for something that another insurance approved? My husband's company is downsizing and word came that in his department, they were going to start letting the staff go. It freaked out my already freaky husband and he looked for another job immediately and got hired. He can't afford to not take this job. What a mess.

That sucks! I bet Medicare will pick up and pay.. and I bet your doctors office and hospital will know how to handle the situation. I have BCBS through my husband's work which is my primary and Medicare (I have been disabled almost 3 years due to arthritis) and husbands BCBS is self-insured and have an exclusion to any type of WLS no matter if it is medically necessary...but I have been assured by my surgeon's insurance guru that Medicare will pay after BCBS denies. Good luck to you!

I forgot to mention...if you expect medicare to pay you must have your surgery at a medicare approved Centers for Excellence and at this moment...there are NONE in Arkansas. That is why I am having mine in Louisiana...Shreveport..which is only about 90 miles from me. Also, you need to make sure the surgeon you pick operates at one of these hospitals and that the surgeon and hospital accept medicare. You may already know that, but I didn't! Didn't take me long to thankfully find a surgeon nearby who does accept medicare patients and he operates at a medical COE hospital that also accpets medicare! Thank God! I started out looking into lapband and went to a seminar in Texarkana, but got sidelined when medicare came up with this new rule in early March of this year. Texarkana's Wadley Hospital (where I was going to get the band) is not a COE either. Then I changed my mind and decided to have a RNY. I have everything done except my Psych evaluation and EGD...then I get a surgery date! Psyche eval is 6/2, then will schedule EGD. Can't wait!

I have all the test done, even the psych eval. Who is your surgeon and what hospital. I am looking at Dallas and Missouri right now.

My Surgeon is Dr. George Merriman at Surgical Specialists of Shreveport, phone 318-222-3132. The hospitals he uses are Doctors Hospital of Shreveport and Christus Schumpert Medical Center. I chose Doctors because his coordinator for WLS has had lapband (he did hers) and she chose Doctors. She also says it is cheaper than Schumpert...but both are medicare COE hospitals and both accept medicare. I have heard that less WLS are being done at Schumpert now than Doctors because Doctors has the American Bariatic Center on site. And all of Doctors rooms are private so being a medicare patient I won't have to share a room and being from out of town I will want my husband or daughter staying with me and you can't have anyone stay overnight with you if you are in a semiprivate room...so that was another plus for Doctors. Dr. Merriman has done hundreds and hundreds of RNY surgeries and a couple hundred lapbands. So, where are you from in Arkansas? I would think Shreveport would be much more convenient for you than Dallas if you are in North Arkansas....I am not sure how close to a CEO Hospital in Missouri. Do you have the link to the medicare list of COEs? If not I can give it to you....the link I have might be the American Biaratic Societies link but I read in another post that Medicare has told someone on here that they left it up to the American Bariatric Society to choose the hospitals it considered to be COEs. Dr. Merriman also is well trained in the DaVinci Laparoscopic robotic surgery too. I can give you his website too if you are interested.

Well, I am a dummy....I see you are from Fayetteville. LOL. There is also a surgeon in Mempher who operates at St Francis Hospital...a female...I forget her name. I called her office before I found Dr. Merriman and she accepts medicare patients and does both procedures and St Francis is a COE. But Memphis is a 4 hour drive one way for me...Shreveport is only 1 1/2 hour drive one way.

I just called your doctor and his reception said that while he takes medicare, there are no hospitals there that take it. Was she mistaken?

You need to call back and ask to speak to Kim. She is the coordinator. The receptionist must be nuts because Doctors hospital absolutely takes medicare. Look at Doctors Hospital of Shreveport website and it states that they do take Medicare. Kim knows that my BCBS will deny my surgery and told me that Medicare WILL pay. I even ask her if they had ever had Medicare deny payment (because you can't precertify with Medicare like you can with other insurances) and she said absolutely not. I will find the URL for Doctors Hospital for you so you can read it for yourself. Be back in a minute.

OK, read down in this page in the third paragraph of the Admissions Policy http://www.dhshreveport.com/information/index.cfm

I already called Missouri and they are booked for the next six months, but I called Kim and I have an appointment for June 22. She said that I could watch the video and not do the seminar and they would take all my tests. I'm excited. I might get a date by the end of July. Yeah!!! Thank you so much.