NewStart at Memorial Hermann Memorial City Medical Center Hospital

The nursing staff was incredible, especially my night nurse. The first night I was out of it and my husband said this poor nurse was trying so hard to keep me comfortable and I was being somewhat difficult. When she came on duty the second evening, she ran another nurse out of my room saying that she would be taking care of me and that is what she did. Due to my complications, I remained on the monitors and IV through the second night, which meant I had to get up to go to the bathroom every hour or so. She responded immediately to my calls and by time I returned to bed, she had my bed straightened or changed and then attended to any other needs I had. This was simply the best hospital care I have ever encountered.

The negative to this hospital is the parking. It is difficult to find and is way overpriced as far as I am concerned. The hospital covered valet parking on the day of surgery but we had to pay for the next two days. The day I went home, we paid $8.00 for just over an hour.

I felt that the staff was very attentive (and even entertaining at times!) to my needs. Even more important, I felt they were very responsive. While the hospital is not luxury status, I felt it was well above the average comfort level for a hospital -- I had a private room, phone and a flat screen TV.

I was in a new wing and everything was top notch including the nurses.

Dr. Naaman, Julius, and Mary are a great team. The surgery staff are awesome and take care of every detail. Loved the purple Carebear warming blanket. It was really needed and calming in the prep area that I was in and afterwards.

My first impression of Dr. Spiegel was wow, this is someone that know what i am going through or have gone through. And he was able to recognize that I was a person that had a problem, tried everything out there and this was my last shot. I still have the same impression about him. His office staff, now thats a whole nother story. In the begining they are nice and helpful, but after your surgery they dont care aobut you and they make you feel like you are wasting there time. The best one in the office to speak with is Rita Holman, she will help you to the best of her ablity. But Pam and Lorena act like they dont have time to answer your question and if you dont watch it, Pam will leave you on hold for 15 to 20 minutes. I would tell future patients to have Dr. Spiegel and his staff make sure you see a nutrionist before and after surgery. I didnt get that and now i am struggeling big time. They stress after care alot, but his office could do more for patients as far as aftercare is concerned. No there is no structured aftercare program. They do go over in great detail about the risk of surgery. Overall i would give him a 8.5. I think both surgical competence and bedside manner are great.

Dr. Spiegel was very impressive and answered any questions I had. He also seems to care about his patients. All of his staff are banded and know what you're going through. They are VERY busy but will answer any questions you may have. Will let you know more after PreOp and Surgery.

'I was impressed the moment Dr. Speigel began speaking at the seminar. He is very confident in what he is doing

I'm very pleased with Dr. Spiegel. He did a wonderful job with my band.

Dr Speigel is very nice and always helpful. Anyone looking for a good surgeon should go and talk to him. His office staff is very helpful also.

This is not so much about Dr. Spiegel as it is about his Houston office on West Alabama. (I didn't really spend enough time with Dr. Spiegel to form any opinion.)

I had already sat through an evening seminar Physicians SurgiCenter office. Dr. Spiegel was detained in traffic that evening on the way from his Port Neches office, and so the LAP-BAND Program Coordinator, Tracy Dallenbach, did the seminar. It was very informative, but also very, very positive -- perhaps deceptively so. Among the things we were told at the seminar was that recovery from this surgery would involve very little pain afterwards, that we would never feel hungry afterwards, and that any reflux problems would immediately be gone. A friend of mine who underwent the procedure with Dr. Spiegel shortly afterwards had awful gas pains for more than a week, felt like she was starving the first week, and continued to have terrible reflux problems. She still would've opted to have the surgery, but she feels that she would've been better prepared to handle the problems had she been adequately warned that she might actually have some of those problems.

I went to the West Alabama office just this past Saturday morning (28 Jan 06), for a 10:30 consultation. I felt like I was at a cattle call. I had spent considerable time filling out the papers that I was given at the previous seminar, and though I had those papers with me, I was dismayed to find that I had to fill out all of the SAME information on another form.

After being crammed into the office with dozens of other patients and prospective patients for over an hour, I was finally weighed. The weighing went something like this:

OFFICE WORKER: "How tall are you?" [I had been led to believe at the seminar that my height would be measured for accuracy. Didn't happen.]

ME: [to the office worker] "5' 5", or maybe just a little under."

OFFICE WORKER: "Let's make that 5' 4". Now step on the scales."

ME: "Should I take off my shoes?"

OFFICE WORKER: "Oh, no -- don't do that."

When the scale registered 279.2, the OFFICE WORKER said, "Let's round that up to 280."

I understand her thinking, but it just felt weird to have a medical professional fudge on those kinds of things.

When I finally saw Dr. Spiegel in a sparse examining room that contained only a plastic chair and an examining table, we shook hands, and he had me lay back on the table. He showed me the areas where the incisions would be, then helped me sit up, and asked if I had any questions. I didn't due to my research and the seminar. He said something to the effect of, Well, you really need the surgery, so I hope you get it."

I told him that the only thing I would be waiting on would be my insurance approval.

It was then that the woman who had come into the examining room with him took over while Dr. Spiegel went out the door. She looked very unprofessional -- wearing a very snug lycra-type top with sequins all across her bust. She handed me a sheet of paper telling me what my insurance expected me to do. She said I would be assigned a "case worker" who would call the insurance company to confirm their requirements and then start pulling together information I would need to meet those requirements. In the meanwhile, if I wanted to I could call the insurance company myself just in case the case worker go too busy to get right to it.

I explained to the sequined lady that I had already tried calling and e-mailing the insurance company and had not heard back from them. She jumped in before I was finished speaking to tell me that I had to keep trying, find more numbers to call, etc. It was obvious that she was in a hurry to get on to the next prospect.

As she was heading out the door, I had to ask, "So, what do I do to get started? Should I call my regular physician and set up an appointment."

"Yes, that's it. Exactly." And she was gone.

I would think that is information that she would've thought was important enough to tell me without my having to practically catch her going out the door to ask about.

I am sure that Dr. Spiegel is a wonderful surgeon, but the whole office experience was an incredible turn-off. I am now looking at other Houston-area surgeons who perform the LAP BAND surgery. I mean, considering my insurance requirements, I am going to be dealing with someone's office staff for at least the next 7-8 months just to get to a surgery date. I don't want to feel like just a number. I definitely don't want to feel like I did during those two hours last Saturday.