St Joes Hamilton Patient Relations and Anyone with Revision

Hi Everyone

I thought I would update you on information that I now finally have. Apparently our surgeons cover bariatric, cancer and emergency surgeries. They only provide so many blocks for surgeries and they provide them in 2 month blocks with basically a week or 2 notice. There is a current backlog since apparently they did not perform any bariatric over the summer. Only Dr. Hong will do revision surgeries in a single surgery and Anvari will typically complete them in 2. Because of this, Dr. Hong is typically assigned the revisions. Dr. Hong and his office have not been providing the required blocks for revision so there is actually a patient who has been waiting since February for a surgery date.

Meaghan has asked Dr. Hong if he would consider releasing a block to do my surgery in September or October and it was denied and they said to ask Anvari. They were also not clear as to whether or not a block will be released for November and December at this time.

While all of this has been going on, I escalated my frustration to contacting patient services at St. Joes. I very politely explained my situation, the inability to actually get in contact with Meaghan and that it is a well known problem amongst the patients. I ended my email with: "While it is not my place to tell the hospital how to run things or handle their business, one would think that for the reputation of your hospital and the success of your patients in the program, you would look at hiring additional staff to support Meaghan in this role as it is a well-known issue within the clinic. "

Patient Relations got back to me within 30 minutes of my email and I supposed to be getting a call from the Manager of the Clinic. I am either going to be black listed from the program or I am going to at least have something done for those of us who had the lapband prior to this system being in place and have been living with the complications for 10 years. If it is the later, you can bet you last dollar that if I am able to get my surgery pushed through, I am going to be pushing for the poor woman that has been waiting since February to finally have hers done as well.

Sorry Gbears :(

Well done gbears. That is absolutely unacceptable. I'm glad to learn you have escalated this, and you are starting to get answers.

If they blacklist you, which I can't imagine, you can complain the Ontario Ombudsman.

Also, if they can't find a slot for you in your timeline, you can request they transfer your surgery to Guelph. They are moving quickly. And you've waited long enough.

Keep pushing. You're super close! This isn't right. Good job, girl!!!