HE SAID YES!!!!!

 Had a consult with my GP this morning to ask about a referral to Dr Nguyen or Sampath, and he immediately said yes!

I was a little worried he'd say no and told him so, he pretended to be hurt, it was all good.  He's referred one patient there, and multiple general surgery patients to Dr Nguyen. He was impressed with the info the clinic had sent to his office a while ago and really likes the multi factorial approach.

Fortunately he knows me well and wasn't patronizing or overly cautionary about the risks and how it's a tool, not a cure, etc etc - he knows I research the hell out of any suggestion I've ever made...

So now I just wait for the clinic to call - I think he was making the referral to whichever surgeon had the best wait list.  He also said that some extra money was being pushed out towards Bariatric surgery by the ministry, so yay!

SO EXCITED!!!!

Last fiscal year, ending March 31, 2012, the number of bariatric surgeries doubled, so there should be about 150 or a few more that could be completed by then.  I can't remember the exact number.  I also don't know that if they can't be fit in before the end of March, does that surgery money get carried over into the next fiscal year or is it just lost?

I assume that if the number of bariatric surgeries have been almost doubled, that the actual OR time allocated for the surgeries is also doubled.  I beleive they are two different things and that might be something you want to find out as well........

Yay!!!!  Good news, I was shocked when I got the same reaction from my doc when I first asked him about it but now I've had the surgery and he's very happy with the results.  my doc also prefers to send his patients there now as he likes their assessment process much better as well.

I know that last year the docs did get extra money for the surgery and they were doing 2 a week, not sure if that will continue or not.  Hope that you don't have to wait very long to get the call for the first appt. and can start the whole process quickly.