RNY in India

I just found this forum and saw a lot of people were asking about India. I had RNY surgery in Mumbai, India on 5 Nov 2007. I am 5 months post op and am now at a 24.8 BMI. I thought I'd cue in and offer that if you have questions about India, feel free to PM me. A few things though - I did like the hospital, it was VERY nice, VERY modern, and nearly everyone spoke great english. MRIs, CT Scans, portable Xray units all ubber modern. The pain meds were fine while you are in the hospital, once you leave, they don't have good pain RXs. Their diet follow up SUX! and goes against everything we are told in the states. (i.e. they wanted me to try to get 1000 calories in starting with 1 month post op - YEAH RIGHT!) You are really playing their game until you get out of the hospital then you really need to be strong enough to launch out on your own for your nutrition. My surgeon made my stoma 2x the size of western docs - this means NOTHING gets stuck - if I can swallow it, it will go down, and it doesn't constrict like a lot of people's that you hear about. Now me still sometimes eating too much is still an issue - LOL. The trip to India is freaking LONG!!!!!!!!!!!!!! and tickets are expensive. I am stationed in Europe right now so India made way more sense then Mexico for me, but total travel time was still like 14 hrs each way - UGH. Once you leave the hospital - it's nasty. They even filter the air in the hospital, that's why it's so nice. Most the rest of the country is slums.  I had complications (nothing to do with the where or how the surgery was done) so my 'tourist' part was canceled. If you do chose medical tourism, make sure you take your vaca BEFORE you operate. I was in the hospital a total of 13 days, 5 in ICU and two surgeries. My surgeon was one of the top two obesity surgeons in the country - I paid more for his experiance. Total cost for RNY, complications, first class rooms, private ICU ward, etc was right at $16,000. (it was only supposed to be $12K but the extended stay and second operation added on quite a bit). So much more I could say, but if you have questions, feel free to ask away. Cass

   My DH is Indian and when I was first thinking of WLS, he made it very clear the last place he wanted me going was India. He is there 3-4 months out of the year as we have a computer company there and he won't even have a tooth pulled there.      The travel time is long and grueling, Emirates has the best flight options from NY but that is still 18 hours non-stop before you transfer to Mumbai. The weather is terrible at best, the poverty saddening and the surgeons not as experienced as Mexican or American doctors as this operation is new to them. I am a huge fan of Medical Tourism and Indians LOL just not sure I want to mix the two .      Glad it has worked so well for you. Namaste