Medicare stinks!!

I have completed all my tests, classes thru Portsmouth hospital and Medicare just passed a rule that the hospital has to pass the Center of Excellence test. The only one that does is in Bangor Maine. If anyone here has Medicare, please call your doctor's office and check it out. The only requirement is that the hospital has to do at least 125 operations a year and Portsmouth only does 90. Good luck.

I am so sorry to hear that Sandy, that is awful. I don't know about the hospital in Maine but about the same distance in the hospital in Connecticut where my best friend had her surgery. The staff and the doctor where awesome, I was actually going to go through him myself but my insurance forced me to go to another doctor at Yale. New Haven: Hospital of Saint Raphael Elmer L. Valin, MD, LLC http://www.ct-obesitysurgery.com/ I was just looking at the list, I can't believe there is none in Massachusetts and New Hampshire. Jennie

Hi Sandy-- Wow!! Sorry to hear about the new rule. I have medicare as well. I just had my surgery Dec. 28th. I had mine done at DHMC in Hanover. they are fantastic. I know they do many many surgeries. My surgeon has done well over 600 of them himself. Not sure when this new rule went into effect, but you might want to check out DHMC. They are one of the best programs out there. I know one of the rules for me as far as medicare was that my surgery would be covered if I had 2 or more comorbidities. I had a few so it was covered. Hope this helps you. Shelley

i know its so terrible...portsmouth hosp was telling me about a woman that had completed the whole program and was scheduled for surgery next week,i feel so bad for her,how devastating!!im getting married in may,so i am lucky enough to be able to get his insurance,and hopefully get the surgery through them.if worse came to worse,i would ask my fiancee to take out a second morgage,im that serious!im so sorry....i did talk to a friend and she heard about this also,she is on medicare,she said they are doing it in boston?i dont know how true that is.i hope it works out for you!

I'm so sorry for this bad news. But even if you have the surgery a distance away, they usually let you have your clearances locally. I live in NH and had my surgery in PA. I did all my clearances here. Barix Clinics does only bariatric surgery; my surgeon has done over 1200 of them. I feel SO SO blessed that we have federal BCBS from my husband having worked at the US Postal Svce. for years. We kept it when he took early retirement. I had my first appointment in mid November and had my surgery Feb. 22nd. Felt long to me but compared to the stories I have read here I flew through the process. Sending positive thoughts for a good outcome for you! Valerie Z.

Hi I'm a portsmouth hospital about to be lap band patient and if my information is right you can call nancy but prh and parkland hospital are sister hospital's and they are joining the bariatic teams together and one advantage is they May qualify for medicaire. Like I said call nancy but that is the rumor. Good luck