Why don't you got back to your surgeon and get some fill taken out.

Hello All:  I'm banded for 7 years now and just recently my port is giving me problems with feelings of discomfort.  Do any of you know what could be the problem?  Can it be a slight re-positioning of the port or do you think it's something else.  Thank you.

Oh no, I'm sorry to hear this. I had a good experience with him, but I understand! That's too bad and I'm very sorry to hear it. I wouldn't have wanted another band, either, under any cir****tances. 

Dr. Baptista was the doctor who put in the lapband. When the complications started in Scotland I reached out to him and he tried to help as much as he could. However, when we went to see him when we got back, he insisted that there was no way that his lapband could have slipped that the doctors in Scotland didn't know what they were talking about. Then he said that he could remove the old band and put in a new one, but my daughter told him that she did not want a new band that the things that had happened to her a frightened her away from having a new one. Once she said that she didn't want a new band, his whole attitude changed and he was through with her. The insurance company said the only way that they might possible cover it is if the physician wrote a letter saying that it was medically necessary. When we asked him to do this he flat out said no, that it was a waste of his time. And then they stopped returning my daughter's calls. He may be kind and compassionate if you go along with what he wants you to do, but if you don't want his lapband anymore, he is done with you.

My daughter had a lap band done in 2008 when she was a 21 year old student on our insurance. Last month, she was visiting Scotland and got really sick. At the hospital in Scotland they did tests that showed her band had slipped and she was totally blocked. 2/3 of her stomach had slipped up over the top of the band and they told her she had to have it out immediately. The did laproscopic but could not safely take it out that way. So they just cut it in half. They also cut the tube leading to her port. She was told that when she got home to the US she had to have it removed. She has been having horrible pains where the tube to the port is now poking her in the side. She is home and we went see a doctor. She is now a high school teacher and has her own insurance. Her insurance does not cover bariatric surgery and the doctors say that her insurance will not pay to remove it because it's bariatric. The doctor here says that by cutting the band where they did in Scotland, they have left rough edges that are going to erode into her stomach and cause major damage. They say it's medically necessary, but that they don't think her insurance is going to cover it. Does anybody have any suggestions? She doesn't have the money to pay cash for an operation (and neither do I), it's going to cost a fortune.