structured diet!!

I just called my insur co (UnitedHealth) to ask about the requirements for Lap-band. Has anyone gotten around this? I cant believe I have been on diets for 30 yrs and now I have to prove I was on a structured diet within the last 2 yrs. My recent Nutrisystem episode wont help either bec it wasnt structured. I have suffered thru WAI****chers 3x and now I have to be able to prove it. This will set me back by 6 mos! Any advice would help. Thanks, Kelly

I am new to this process, but I think that it realy depends on the insurance company. Have you attended any of the seminars. I went to the one at St. Agnes and they answered a lot of my questions. they were even insurance company specific. The longest part of my process so far was getting copies of my medical records. This took 5 months.

I had to see a Nutritionist at GBMC during the period of time I was having all of my testing completed. I wouldn't panic about anything until you have your program set up by your surgeon. Most insurance companies are requiring a monitored 6 month diet. I think only self-pay patients are able to have the surgery quickly. It will come in time. Don't dispair. aime

I had united Healthcare and they didnt ask for a supervised diet. The first insurance I had when I started the process was Cigna and they wanted to see what diets I have tried So my PCP wrote a letter saying what diets I was on throughout my life. They were never supervised but i would tell her what I was doing. Weigh****chers one time, Metabolife. Dont panic it will all work out. If you have to do it just thing you will loose weight before and that will be a good feeling. Sometimes they do not make you do te full 6 months. This is what I have heard from others. I know it is a set back but your date will be when it is your time. All things happen for a reason. I started my wls decision in Chrismas of 04 I decided to research it and choose from 2 docs I saw and just had my surgery Last July 06. It was well worth the wait. Good Luck and keep us posted

Hi Kelly, I have BXBS of ILL. They required a 6 month Physician assisted diet with full documentation. I had to go to the Dr once a month for 6 months and in the end they wanted the full set of notes from those sessions. They also wanted a 10 year diet history. This included start and stop dates, beginning and ending weights and information on what was successful and what was not. Since much of my dieting had been through suggestions from the primary care Dr this was not much of a problem for me. I will say, though, once I got everything together, the insurance co has been very very good (but the bills are really coming in now...so I need to wait another month or so before I really pat them on the back). The best advice I can give you is just hang in there...do what the insurance co requires. Six or even Twelve months may seem like a long wait...but in the end, it ensures that you are ready for this change in your life. Best of luck and let us know how it goes. Thanks, Dave

I have United Health care and used my weigh in books from Weigh****chers along with an email from the on-line time frame I was with Weigh****chers. I believe so long as part of the book/on-line registration was within the last year or two it was okay. Good luck, Robin

Hi Kelly, My insurance also requires a 6 month supervised weight loss visits. I was lucky when they considered my surgeon's program a multi disciplinary program and allowed me to do only 3 months. During that time I was busy taking all the required exams that they requested me to have before surgery. Stay focus everything will fall into place for you. Best wishes Cira