Dr Wasco/Theda Clark

hello! It is me again.  Soooo now I am narrowing my choices down to LAPBand or VSG.  Any thoughts???   It appears Dr. Wasco is one of the only surgeons doing VSGs in WI.  Does anyone know of anyone else doing them???  Thanks!!!

Can't help you make the decision between them, I had a RNY.  But I can tell you that Dr. Wasco and his clinic are great.  I ahve no complaints on them.
Good Luck
Missy

I also can't help w/ your question... but I will agree with the other poster... Dr. Wasco and his staff are wonderful. I have nothing but good things to say about him!

Go outside of Wisconsin and interview.  Read my posting to the person who posted on 8/2/08 feeling rather down because they were no longer able to qualify.  If that doesn't change your mind, nothing will.  I also have kept complete documentation from day one of this nightmare that started several years ago.  I have complete documentation from the team of physicians on the East Coast that had the privledge of cleaning up Kevin Wasco's mess.  I am having a meeting with one or several staff persons (who I will not name at this time) fro Theda Clark next week to show them the evidence.  I have also sent all documentation to the a Hospital Review committee.  Perhaps Theda Clark will have to decide if this walking liability and horrible human being is worth the money he may be bringing in the front door?  Perhaps they will have to look at whether or not they wish to continue to grant him priveldges or not?  I have given all of my information to Board members, local TV stations and I will not stop.  Don't settle for anything less than the best because you deserve only the best!   Believe me, Kevin Wasco is far from the best!  When his own peers are willing to write information contrary to what he said and did, it is highly unusual.  My information is open to anyone who wishes to read it.  It is, in fact, open to the public.  DON'T SETTLE BECAUSE HE IS THE CLOSEST GEOGRAPHICALLY.  That is what I did and look where it got me!!   

Thanks for all the info.  I have done a lot of research since this post.  I am NOT going with Theda b/c I am self pay and they are way too expensive!   In all my research, I have discovered that there are several DRs in WI now doing VSG, they just do not advertise since they have not done many.  If anyone wants info on several programs, I wilI pass on the info I collected.  I am pretty sure I have decided to go to LapSF with Jossart and Cirangle who are the grand poohbahs of VSG and their self pay package is $17.5 and is all inclusive.  Um, why not go to THE best, and pay less?  I am all about that.  I lived in SF for over 5 years and my significant other is still there as well as friends, so, I do have an advantage since I will have a support system there.  Just trying to secure the financing and get the time off with my employer.  Hope to get it done by the end of the year.  I will keep you all informed!!

You are very wise to have done as much research as you obviosly did and you are wise to be going elsewhere.  I wish I would have done more research before I jumped into it.  You will find a night and day difference once you get to one of the other clinincs - both in surgeons and the entire experience.  I know I did.  Once I got to this much larger facility (one of the largest in the country) they pinpointed the problem in a matter of 48 hours.  They let me know it would not be easy to correct, but they immediately got to work on correcting it.  I just had my 5th surgery this past Thursday since Kevin Wasco and I have 2 more to go.  Then things will be in great shape.  Let me know how you proceed.  I'm so happy you didn't fall into the Kevin Wasco trap - he is a smooth talker.  He would probably do well as a used car salesman.  At least he couldn't put people's lives in danger that way.  Good Luck to you.

may I pls ask what happened to you that you don't like Dr Wasco cuz I was going to be changing Dr's to him but maybe not now can you share you may email me at [email protected] hope to hear from you and your input

I hope you think long and hard before you change to this physician.  Tomorrow (Sept 3, 2008) I will be meeting with a panel of personnel at Theda Clark Hospital regarding my experience with him.  I will also be bringing all of the information I have from my team of surgeons that I subsequently had to go to for resolution (in other words to clean up his mess).  They have substantiated beyond a reasonable doubt  that surgical error was the beginning of my 3 year nightmare.  While surgeons are only human, and humans make errors, I can accept that.  It is the events following the fact that he certainly knew he made an error that angered me.  He was (and I am sure he still is) rude, arrogant, incompetent, untruthful, lacks skill and experience and the list goes on and on.  At this time, I am not planning to file a lawsuit against Kevin Wasco.  Although, three of four malpractice attorney's that reviewed my case were willing to take the case, I decided that would be too easy.  I have worked in the insurance industry for over 23 years and I know the case would get settled by the insurance company, and Kevin Wasco's malpractice insurance premiums would increase.  For the amount the premiums would increase Vs the amount of settlement I would potentially receive, it would take years for that insurance company to make up that settlement.  Meanwhile, Kevin Wasco goes right on earning an above average income, there would be notation at the Dept of Licensing and Regulation of the lawsuit, but most often these settlements come with some sort of gag order and no details are revealed .  I am not about that.  I do not need nor do I want any monetary settlement.  I want to keep this unskilled surgeon from ever hurting another person like he did me.  After my meeting tomorrow I will be filing my final complaint with the State Of Wis., Dept of Licensing.  I will also be forwarding a copy  with all of the supporting evidence to the Surgical Review Corp., American Medical Association, Wis Medical Association, SAGES, Hospital Review Committee, each member of the board of Trustees at Theda Clark (three of them have already been notified) and any other organization that he is either a member or has received accreditation from.  I did hire an attorney to assist me in some steps of the way, but I have not retained an attorney to file a lawsuit against him.  Both the persons that I am meeting with at Theda Clark and I have agreed there would be NO legal counsel at the meeting on 9/3/08.  I also intend to scan my complete complaint and all of the supporting documentation and evidence and e-mail it to anyone who wishes to read it.  I have nothing to hide.
I would like to post it on this web site, but I have an attorney checking on the legality of that.  If it cannot be posted I will simply put it in blog form and it will be available on my blog.  My attorney did not write my complaint, however, I hired a professional medical witness firm to assist me in the preparation, so that all of the medical facts are presented correctly.
This has been a long, drawn out process by Kevin Wasco.  My meeting at Theda Clark was supposed to be on July 30, but my Mother passed away on July 29, so I had to postpone it.  Ohio State University recently did an experimental study over 4 years.  While the trend has been for physicians to be trained in how to avoid lawsuits and to be always consciously aware of lawsuits, they trained a group of physicians to be aware, but the complaints and potential lawsuits were handled via means of an arbitration committee.  While the entire study goes into much greater detail (I can give you the web site name to read about it), the bottom line is that the percentage of lawsuits filed has dropped by 32%, and that 88% of the time, the patient or the patent's family merely wanted to hear the words "I'm sorry" from the physician and the physician to: 1) explain what, in his or her opinion what went wrong ; 2) explain to the patient what he or she could do to make it right, if anything, and 3)what he or she thinks the patient should do from that point.  Most often, however, just the fact that the physician was willing to look the patient in the eye and say "I'M SORRY" was all it took.  Steps one, two and three were not needed most of the time.  I can assure you that had Kevin Wasco (or the senior partner in his practice) ever sat down and listened and then said "I'm sorry" and "this is what I can do to make it right" it would have ended all problems, all feelings of hostility and mistrust, and probably saved all parties concerned a lot of time and money.  Kevin Wasco chose to hide behind an attorney, refused to answer any further questions and did not follow through on any of the things he said he was going to do.  He therefore had to falsify medical documents and had to stoop as low as any physician can possibly stoop - he had to try to make it look like I was unreasonable and crazy.  Unfortunately that was his choice, so he has left me no other alternative except to react to his actions.  Please wait until after tomorrow and I assure you that I can and will provide you with all details.
My Mother always taught all of her children to work hard, to be choosy, to never settle for anything less than the best, to be honest, to say "thank you", "I love you" and "great job" to someone each day, and most of all, always let your handshake or word mean more than anything that can be written on paper.  So to answer your question, why don't I like Kevin Wasco?  I'm not sure if it's a matter of liking him or not.  I guess either he wasn't raised with the same values (or he was raised with them, but has chosen not to use them) .  I think he is a detriment to the public if he can continue to practice medicine without additional training in skill, ethics and conduct.  Again, I will never sit back and allow anyone else to be hurt by this physician (and I use the word physician very loosely in this case).  If you have a physician now, I can assure you no matter who it is, he or she is better than Kevin Wasco.  Do your homework before you proceed!!!!        

what all happened to you that you went through 3 yrs of hell heatlth wise if you don't mind sharing and i would love to read the docs if you want pls email me any info to my email address at [email protected] and i wish you the best of luck with your health and hope to hear from you soon

thanks

Why would you want to switch physicians if you just had surgery in March?  I am just curious.