Alfredo Fernandez Bariatric Surgeon M.D.,F.A.C.S.

I met with Dr. Fernandez at one of his seminars. I attended a seminar for the Wish Center a week before and walked away with a lot of questions. Dr. Fernandez's Presentation was extremely informative and answered all my questions. He has been doing bariatric surgery for about 6 months and, he has years of experience doing other complicated surgeries laproscopically. His staff is extremely friendly and helpful. His staff offers monthly support group meetings free of charge for both pre and post operative bariatric patients and of course he has his seminars. I have had all the work ups and am waiting to meet with him to schedule my surgery.

12/03/03 - My appointment with Dr. Fernandez went very well. I have my surgery date...December 17th.

12/29/03 - I am now almost 2 weeks post op and Dr. Fernandez and his staff were wonderful. Besides Dr. Fernandez, Becky, his Patient Care Coordinator, came by every day while I was in the hospital. They were so caring. I would highly reccommend them to anyone seeking to have this surgery.

I met Dr. Fernandez the first time at the <a href="http://www.tampabariatrics.com">Tampa Bariatrics</a> November WLS Seminar. I felt the presentation that he gave was very informative. It was not a sales pitch, like I had heard other WLS associations were in the Tampa-Bay area. He gave an extensive presentation on the surgery and all the issues should be considered before making the decision that this surgery is right for each individual there.

I was impressed. After the presentation, he spoke individually to anyone that had questions or concerns.

What I thought was most impressive was the entire staff attended the seminar. The case worker, the resident psychiatrist, the nutritionalist and the surgeon were all in attendance and were there to answer any and all questions.

In December, I attended the support group that they offer. The support group as well as the seminars are given at the <a href="http://www.townandcountryhospital.com/">Town and Country Hospital in Tampa, Florida.</a>

It was a wonderful evening. Everyone was a big happy family. I would guess-timate about 60 people attended. It was a very special evening and made me even feel more comfortable. To see the people who have already gone through what I am planning made me feel even more comfortable with the life-changing event.

From the very first meeting, Dr. Fernandez (who came very highly recommended) was warm, caring, concerned and never made us feel rushed when asking questions. He has proven to be even more than we expected when we first met him. What an incredible surgeon and so caring.

His staff is friendly, informed and caring and they greet you with smiles and hugs.

Dr. Fernandez does a free, initial, seminar where he explains the entire procedure (laparoscopic) and then allows you plenty of time to speak with him one-on-one and ask questions. He stresses all of the risks and explains them thoroughly. You don't meet with him, personally, again until just prior to your surgery.

Dr. Fernandez does stress aftercare and has a great follow up and there is also a support group and lots of support contacts.

My husband & I both had the surgery, same day, and we couldn't be more pleased. Our opinion is that Dr. Fernandez proved to be the perfect surgeon for us . . both in excellent surgical skills and bedside manner. He greets you with smiles and hugs and is always complimentary. You can't help but smile when you're talking to him. Very inspiring and we think he's the absolute best!

10/29/03 I met Dr. Fernandez last night at an information seminar and was very impressed. He is very friendly and informative. He explained the proceedure in a very understandable way. I have an appointment with him on November 12th. He has scheduled my proceedure for Nov. 24th. I am very happy about this and am counting the days.
11/28/03 Hurray!!! My proceedure was done on Monday, November 24th at Town N Country Hospital by Dr. Fernandez. The pre-registration for the hospital was done on 11/12. Everyone that I saw during the process was friendly which helped diminish any anxiety that I was having. The hospital requires that the insurance copay is received at that time. I was not aware of that and had never had to do that before. It would have been better if I would have known that earlier but worked out ok since I did have my check book with me. I have not had any surgical problems, or pain only nausea and dry heaves on the 24th that was quickly relieved by medication. Of course the belly is tender but I don't need any medicine. I came home on Thanksgiving day being thankful for a new life. Dr. Fernandez is the best surgeon that I have ever met.(I have worked as a registered nurse on surgical floors.) He came in to see me twice a day and was very encouraging. The nurses and staff at the hospital are wonderful and were available when I needed them. The only thing that was unpleasant was the NASTY BEEF broth which I quickly substituted with chicken broth from the floor kitchenette. The rooms are very nice and spaceous.There is also comfortable seats for the visitors.
Members from the support group of Dr. Fernandez' patients came to visit and were encouraging. I don't have any idea of how much weight I have lost because I was not weighed on the day of surgery or when I was discharged.

I had my first apointment today with Dr.Fernandez. Very happy with him!!! He is very nice not abrubt like I have found with a couple other surgens I met.He is very easy to talk to and make you feel very comfortable with the surgery. The office staff has been very nice and easy ask questions to and get answers from.The other nice thing about him it did not take months and months to get into see him. I had all my preop testing done for another surgen that I was going to use and since I had it I got appiontment right away.Be perpard to wait when you do go in fot your appiontment I was lucky that at least there were a few of his patients there that I could pick there brian.That was very nice a few othere surgens I looked into were booked up till March next year.Overall I am very happy with Dr.Fernandez and am looking forward for him to be doing my surgery...

My first impression of Dr. Fernandez was in 1999 when he preformed my umbilical hernia repair. He has an excellent bed side manner & is a very capable surgeon.

I attended his support group meeting for Baratric Surgery in April 2003. I was completely convienced to choose him as my surgeon after the seminar. Dr. Fernandez is very "down to earth" and explains every detail of the surgery, especially the risks involved.

Dr. Fernandez performed my operation on July 24, 2003. The surgery went fine and I would highly recommend Dr. Alfredo Fernandez to ANY ONE INTERESTED.

I first met Dr. Fernandez at a new patient information seminar. I was very impressed with the straight forward way he explained the surgery, the dangers, and the lifestyle changes that were necessary post-op. He also was very willing to take time to answer any and all questions from the floor afterward. I live about 2.5 hours away and unlike the other surgeon in Tampa who takes my HMO Dr. Fernandez was more than willing to work with me on allowing me to have my tests, etc done locally rather than in Tampa. This meant that my HMO would cover the tests. Otherwise they would all have been considered out of network and I would have had to pay for them out of pocket.

My impression of Dr. Fernandez has only improved over time. He is a very compentent surgeon with a very caring, personable bedside manner.

His office staff is very caring, kind and considerate. They even hugged me the first time they saw me post-op. They were very helpful dealing with my HMO when they tried to deny my surgery authorization. With a letter from my primary care. They were able to get the surgical authorization by phone the following day. Some surgeons office would not have been willing to spend that much time on the phone with the insurance company and would have made it entirely my problem.

I cannot think of anything that I did not like about Dr. Fernandez. I was disappointed that he was not on duty the weekend after my surgery so that another surgeon saw me on Saturday and discharged me on Sunday. But he more than made up for it when I called on Monday to schedule my post-op follow-up appointment and he personally took my call. He spent 6-7 minutes checking up on how I was doing. Fluids, nausea, fever, incisions, etc.

I think future patients should know that Dr. Fernandez is an excellent lap surgeon. He does all of his RNY's lap. He is very caring. I did not meet anyone at Town and Country Hospital that did not think very highly of Dr. Fernandez as a surgeon and as a doctor. I would highly recommend him as a surgeon.

He emphasizes aftercare. Has his own support group, which he attends. He expects you to supplement your diet with vitamins, protein and minerals as necessary and to get regular labwork.

He has a dietician that works with the patients. You will also be seen in the hospital by a dietican who goes over the post-op diet. You are required to attend support groups. I am being allowed to attend the local support group, because Tampa is inconvenient for me to attend regularly. But he expects his patients to attend some support group regularly.

He addresses the risks of surgery in the patient information seminar. Very openly. Though he does all of his RNY as lap he tells you that there is always the possibility of having to convert to open.

I would rate Dr. Fernandez as a 10 on a scale of 1-10. Anyone who can remove my huge, ballooned up swollen, stone filled gallbladder thru a 1" incision when at least 2 of the stones where that big, is a fantastic surgeon in my book. I look at my gallstones and the picture of my gallbladder before he removed it and I can't believe he did that lap. He did admit that was probably the biggest gallbladder he had ever removed.

Dr. Fernandez probably has the best surgical and bedside manner combined of any doctor/
surgeon I have ever met. I used to work for a group of cardiologists. So I have experience around doctors. Everyone I met at the hospital from housekeeping, orderlies, lab techs, doctors, etc had nothing but good things to say about Dr. Fernandez. Which in my experience is very unusual.

Lap RNY 6/5/03 BMI of 64+
445/413
Dr. Alfredo Fernandez
Town & Country Hospital
Tampa, FL