Approval without ever dieting

One of my good friends decided to go through the process of getting vsg a few months ago. She has never dieted a day in her life, how was that even approved? I'm fairly new here but I had to go through a supervised diet and show past attempts at dieting. Does the fact that she has 2 co morbidities help or something? I'm genuinely curious about this. 

I can only venture guesses. Co-morbidities may have played a part. Money could have been another. It's unlikely her doctor's first motivation is money but the fact is a practice is a business and how they make their living. If she fit the criteria he may feel confident it's okay to proceed. High weight for her frame and age plays a factor.

All of the above were reasons for my approval without dieting I'm pretty sure. Not only did I not diet before I wasn't required to do a pre-op diet either. They were pretty eager to get me on the table and improve my health. I guess they felt all things considered, doing this operation increased the chances of my being impacted more positively both short and long term than leaving things as they were. 

The program before surgery depends mainly on the insurance company. Studies now show there's no correlation between dieting pre op and success after surgery. My surgeon would not require it unless mandated by an insurance plan. I personally thought it was a huge waste of time and resources. Staying at a high weight for six more months made no sense to me.

In my opinion I think the whole going through the preop dieting hoops is bull$#it.  When you are 4 years and further out from surgery, you are living your life the best you can, like before suurgery.  You just have to hope you learned some skills that stick with you along the way. 

It depends on your surgeon and your insurance. If you were cash pay, with the right surgeon, you could probably have WLS next Friday.

My insurance required no preop diet or anything besides either a 35 BMI with 2 comorbidities, or a 40 BMI without. My surgeon required just the usual clearances from PCP, cardiologist, psych eval, etc. From first seminar to surgery could have been as quick as 2 months or so. I took about 6, just to try to be better prepared.

Every insurance company has different requirements.  I didn't have a supervised diet or to show past attempts at dieting.  

It's mostly the insurance company that sets the rules. As was indicated above, if you're self-pay, then it's the surgeon who sets the rules. Some have few requirements; mine (a VERY busy clinic) still required a five month supervised WL program with monthly group nutritionist visits and a psych evaluation. In the end, happily, my insurance changed a couple of months before the surgery date, and I didn't have to pay - YAY!! BUT, had I not already been doing everything the insurance company required, I would have had to delay to fini**** all up.

If you go to Mexico and self-pay, you can probably get it done in a month...

My insurance didn't require diet history. Just 2 nutritional visits and an endoscopy.

It depends on what state you live in, what type of insurance you have and the requirements of your surgeon.  There is no standard to determine who gets surgery and who does not.

I'm in California.  I have PPO Blue Shield.  I had to complete six months of a supervised weight loss program.  My surgeon required several tests (stress test, sleep study, endoscopy, etc.), written history of all weight loss attempts and types of diets I tried, and a psych visit with his in-house psychologist before he would submit my paperwork for approval.  I had at least two comorbidities (HBP and OSA)  All this and my BMI was over 70 

If you're self-pay, it's generally a much quicker process since the only hoops required are writing checks.

I'm more surprised that it was her first choice to try to lose, but not surprised that she was approved. Most people don't think major surgery without trying and failing at other things first.  But she's no more likely to keep off weight lost on her own than we are. Maybe she's the smart one here, not having wasted years (or in my case decades) fighting the yo-yo battle!