Lap Band Removed on 11/4/14
i just had my lap band removed on 11/4/14, it had eroded into my stomach pretty bad and never had any symptoms. I was in the hospital for 4 days and this was the most horrible surgery i've ever had in my life and i've had a lot from tummy tuck, breast reduction, lipo, lap band and so on and this surgery just about took me over the edge. I am now at home with a drain tube and my stomach cut in 6 places with 4 in*****isions. I'm not going to lie, this was very painful and made me very sick. My question is, has anybody has this done and had to wait 3 months to get the gastric sleeve and have a successful outcome??? Was it harder and more painful after the sleeve from this surgery of having band out??? Any answers will be greatly appreciated by anyone that has been through this..
When the band erodes like that they have to give your stomach time to heal and settle down before they can go back in to do another surgery. It sounds like you must have had a pretty severe erosion if they had to cut you like that. When mine was removed they went back in right next to the original incision and no extra cutting. You stand a much better chance of a successful sleeve surgery if you let this one heal first. Lots of docs insist on waiting a few months before doing the revision it is fairly common.Hope you are feeling better soon!
I had one of the first bands that ever came out, it did not have a buckle like they do now and mine only held 5cc's so it did not take much to fill it up. My band was placed in feb 2006. I just know i had the first realize band to ever come out. They found the erosion cause the surgeon who put it in, in memphis neglected me for the past 2 years. I tried telling him for about 1 1/2 years that there was something wrong. The only symptom i had was I was eating the right amount of food and eating clean and still not losing at all. He basically told me to push myself away from the table. My last visit to him was extremely rude and inappropriate so i fired him and found a dr closer to my home who took me in as a patient that God. The first dr would not tell my new dr what kind of band i had or how man cc's was in it so he did an upper gi and round what he thought was a prolapse. Took all fluid out, waited 6 weeks, another upper gi, still prolapsed with no change. So after the 2nd upper gi, new dr ordered a scope and when he went down my stomach he found the whole band had moved inside my stomach except for the buckle. He does not understand and puzzled as to why i didn't have any symptoms. He said i should have been deathly sick but was not, as i said just noticed eating more then normal and no weigh loss. I had surgery last Monday and it was worse then he thought when he got in there. He had to sew my stomach back up into layers and add fat to cover the holes where the band had entered my stomach. It is a very very painful surgery, still on recoup, drain out yesterday and stitches but now i have to wait 3-4 months for the stomach to fully heal before i can get sleeve. hope this helps.
I had my band placed in April 2007. After losing about 35 pounds out of 100, I started having so many problems this year that I decided to finally get it out. My band was totally encapsulated in my stomach and my surgeon couldn't even see it when he got inside. What should have been an outpatient procedure turned into a 18 day hospital stay. I still get sick thinking about it. I originally wanted a revision but my surgeon thought I should just get it removed and when he got inside there was no way he could do a revision even if he wanted to. He said that if I decide to have RNY then I should wait at least a year. I am still not totally healed and can't sleep on my stomach either. This was the most traumatic thing I have been through and I have had breast reduction, etc. I am on the fence about even having the surgery thinking maybe next time I won't be so lucky. And still fat on top of it all. At least if I was thin I would have something to show for all I have been through but I don't even have that. Dr Houston did not place the band but was my Dr afterwards. He was great and came to see me everyday.....even on weekends except one when his partner came.
