6 mo supervised diet - questions!

I am doing a 6 month supervised diet which the insurance company required. I am doing well on the diet with pills. What if I lose alot of weight, will they not cover me. I'm confused!

I would be careful not to go under a BMI of 40 as they might tell you that your doing so well on the diet that they won't cover it. They want to see if you actually fail at the 6 months of dieting. I gained weight on diet pills, GO FIGURE!! I eat when I'm stressed and the insurance company stressed me out BIG time. Donna 338/159

My insurance company had guidelines that said that to qualify for surgery, you had to "fail to lose weight (approximately 10% from baseline) or has regained weight despite participation in a three month physician-supervised multidisciplinary program within the past six months." So if I lost 10% of my weight in that time, they would then deny me for that. You may need to request their guidelines to be sure. In my case, they tried to use this to deny me because I didn't request the surgery until October 2004 and their coverage was ending in December 2004, so there was no time to do the three months, plus they didn't even tell me about this guideline until Dec.9 of that year. However, after fighting through all the appeals, I found out yesterday that they are going to be required to pay!!! I AM APPROVED!!! I was actually able to convince an administrative hearing judge that the supervised diet was not a valid guideline. Good luck to you. I would advise that you not do TOO well, or they may try to use it against you.

I am going down the same road as you. I start my 6 month medical supervised Tuesday. Not happy, I wanted to get the surgery done sooner but the cost is crazy. Good Luck.

Although I'm just starting the process, and am no expert, I do know that when dealing with insurance companies, you have to be willing to play their game. If you are too honest, you won't win. Doing a supervised diet using diet pills will probably make anyone lose weight short term. That's not what we're seeking. We want a permanent solution to our problem. The insurance companies don't care one bit about what we want. It's all about money to them. So, if you get weight loss pills, don't feel you have to take every single one and follow the diet to the letter. I'm sure your doctor, if he's supporting your decision to get bariatric surgery, is aware of the insurance game. So just tell him you're following the diet to the fullest, but don't do anything foolish that's going to jeapordize your surgery, if that's really what you want for yourself. Good luck!