Dr. Garth Davis reads this board...

I went to a seminar at the Davis Clinic tonight in Houston.  Garth and Robert Davis started doing the DS last year after traning from Dr. Simper.  Anyway Dr. Garth said he reads this board and that all of the DSers love to promote their surgery as the only way to go, which I thought was kind of funny.

He hates the lap band, thinks the sleeve is great, and is still of the opinion that the RNY is the way to go and promoted it as the best way to eliminate diabetes.  I had to speak up and mention that the DS was the best way to eliminate diabetes.  I have an appoitment with his father tomorrow, so I will see what his thoughts are.  I'm interested to see if he thinks the RNY is the best.

They both seem to be great surgeons with tons of experience.  They were the Dr's on the TV show Big Medicine and are now filming a new show which he could not reveal the name of.

I thought the science was quite clear that the DS is superior to the RnY for curing diabetes. We would all be interested in any studies the doctor has that show differently.

I had a long discussion about diabetes prevention with my surgeon since diabetes killed both my normal weight parents and I was "pre-diabetic." He agreed that the DS was superior for diabetes cure.

I've also read that in Europe they are doing the switch part of the DS on normal weight patients with type 2 diabetes.

~Becky

Actually he admitted that the DS is superior for diabetes resolution after I mentioned it, it's just that he heavily promoted the RNY.  He did say that the DS is superior for weight loss and mentioned it often but I was the only one in the room that asked about the DS, everyone else asked about RNY.

So he admits that the DS is superior for curing diabetes and is superior for weight loss, but still heavily promotes the RNY?  Why?

I went to Dr. Erik Wilson's seminar this evening (also Houston).   It was a seminar for people who were seeking revisions and there were three of us there for information on DS.  While they discussed a lot of options, they were very, very supportive of DS and spoke highly of its results and complication statistics.  They've performed 50 DS surgeries in I think he said 4 years, no deaths, one leak.  They did also speak highly of the sleeve but I have real concerns about that.  When the lap band came out, it was awesome - bypass - awesome.  Here we are these years out and truth is not so awesome.  One other thing they spoke about was how DS is the gold standard in Italy and is the equivalent in numbers performed to gastrict bypass here.  Another source of research!  Anyway, PM if you want to share notes!

Something I forgot, another thing they discussed were the three surgical options to "fix" RNY.  Not that I've considered bypass as an option, but if I had, seeing all of those RNY revisions would have cured me from EVER considering it.

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You need to make your surgeon decision based on your surgeons skill and experience and history NOT on how nice his office staff are.

All things being equal (which they never are) I would obviously go with the easier staff to work with, but I would put that WAY down on my priority list.

How many DS surgeries has each doc done? What is their pre-op program? Do they do it open or lap? What has been their complication and death rate?

THOSE are the deciders.

Just my .02

~Becky

I plan on asking more about specifics tomorrow at my appointment.  He did mention that they have had no complications so far with the DS, but they are fairly new to it and they do the surgery lap.  They said they will provide details of the pre op program at my first appointment.  I do need to do the 3 month supervised diet for my insurance and he requires a 2 week liquid diet before surgery.  They also require a dietician consult and a psyc consult.

Sounds like Dr. Wilson's practice is probably a better choice than the celebrity duo.