Metamorph1959’s Posts
Indeed, it does seem unfair. And undoubtedly that's why the time on the wait list has jumped so much for Richmond -- people are slotted in ahead of the line. And if I have things figured out more or less correctly, the lengthening of the wait list occurred around the time Medweight got going (it's a relatively new program).
It does make some sense in that candidates for the surgery who have attended Medweight are very well prepared, and I imagine Richmond really likes that. As for me, I feel vindicated, as Dr. Zentner neglected to send in my referral to Richmond and then wouldn't rectify the situation for me. I also might add that I travel quite a distance to get to Coquitlam; it's a whole day for me to attend the 90-minute group medical visits, so I feel I deserve to jump the line! 
In the meantime the wait list for Victoria is much shorter than it used to be, so there's still that option for those who live on the Island or are willing to travel -- and MSP does pay for the ferries. Also, Dr Pewarchuk, who now heads the program there, is very cool. He is also exploring options for working with patients through online technology. I think there's great promise there, although people obviously would still have to travel to Victoria for the surgery itself.
No "maybe" -- things have definitely changed. As of about a year ago, she is no longer with the Victoria program, instead running her own Revolution Medical Clinic.
You have confirmed what I had guessed -- that she has a similar arrangement with Richmond as Dr. Lyon has. Interesting that she's also referring to Burnaby; I had noticed there was a doctor (or doctors?) there listed on the provincial wait list website but couldn't find anything about a program. I guess Zentner's is it.
Too bad you're allergic to Saxenda (aka Victoza or liraglutide), but at least you don't have to deal with the fact that your free supply will run out. I hope you can pass on your free samples to somebody who can't afford to pay for it.
Not many people (including doctors) know about the Medical Weight Management Centre in Coquitlam that Dr. Lyon directs. I just chanced upon it in my desperation to avoid having surgery in Victoria and in the hope of it helping me lose the weight on my own. It's clear that I can't, so I was just thrilled to learn, as I worked my way through their program, that if they deem you to be a good candidate for surgery, it is indeed expedited at Richmond.
I still have some hoops to jump through, but it looks like I'll be having my surgery within 4 months. I've been on the fence for a long time, but at this point I'm more than ready.
I'm concerned that the MWM Centre may be trying to serve too many people. They are seeing hundreds of patients despite not being well-known, and I sense that the staff are very overwhelmed. I'm glad I got in now and not later.
OnlineAnnie, I hope you know that you can do their post bariatric support group. You don't have to have gone through their program to be part of that. I'm not sure if Dr. Lyon himself facilitates that (I believe he does). He is a good guy. Really knows his stuff and is respectful and supportive.
Hi meontheweb,
Can't tell you anything about what Ali Zentner's up to because I haven't seen her in about a year and have no plans to return to her.
I can say that the Medical Weight Management program (Dr. Michael Lyon) in Coquitlam is excellent. If you choose to enter their bariatric stream, they really focus on preparing you for the surgery. I've also learned that if they preapprove you, your surgery at Richmond is expedited.
I'm guessing from another comment on this board that Ali Zentner has the same arrangement with Richmond, but that's only conjecture on my part.
There are still only two places in BC where you can have the surgery -- Victoria and Richmond.
BTW, check out Dr. Matthew Weiner on YouTube -- excellent information!
meontheweb, I have just learned that if you attend the Medical Weight Management Centre in Coquitlam, your surgery in Richmond will be expedited. I suspect from another thread here that that's how it works if you see Ali Zentner as well.
I called Richmond today to find out where I am on the wait list, and the receptionist emphasized that it's a 2-1/2 to 3 year wait these days (so 1-1/2 to 2 years for me). That's for the *orientation*, which everybody has to do, and for which the date is strictly on the basis of when your referral was received.
After the orientation, you have to complete a program at the Garratt Wellness Centre and then go for a bunch of medical tests and have a bunch of appointments with various and sundry professionals before you can get an appointment with one of the surgeons (i.e., Drs. Nguyen, Sampath and Yorke, not Dr. Zentner) to get approval for surgery.
What I'm guessing from Dr. Zentner telling you you'd be "fast-tracked" through Richmond is that if you complete a program with her, you may not have to do the Garratt Wellnes Centre program before being sent for all the tests and appointments you'll need to have before surgery. You still have a 2-1/2 to 3 year wait for the orientation and then I'm guessing at least another 2 months until the consult with the surgeon.
It's a long, slow process...
Well, good luck. She said I was a good candidate, and I thought she was wonderful, too, until I started gaining weight by reducing my carbs beyond what I had already done and eating more meat to get more protein... Just don't make that mistake. She doesn't have much to offer beyond (1) Victoza, if you can afford it, (2) low-carb / high-protein, if it works for you, and (3) surgery. Be sure, also, to read up thoroughly about surgery -- especially about the chances of regain -- because she does not help at all with the mental health aspects of obesity.
There's a new drug that has been approved in Canada, Contrave. It's likely to be as expensive as Victoza, but it's a combination of 2 generic drugs, bupropion and naltrexone, and she might be willing to prescribe those now that Contrave has been approved (it hadn't been when I last saw her). However, naltrexone is still quite expensive, despite being a generic drug.
Nice that she's offering options for patients who don't live in Vancouver. That's new, too.
Nice, too, that she's suggesting fast-tracking you through Richmond, as she wouldn't do anything about the fact that a year after she agreed to refer me there, I found out that she hadn't done so...
Okay, I found this:
"In 2015, Ali became the Medical Director of the Vancouver Island Bariatric Program and built the program into a multidisciplinary bariatric program which now supervises the bariatric surgeries of over 200 patients annually. After three years as director she moved on to establish a similar bariatric program within Fraser Health region."
Ali Zentner -- Revolution Medical Clinic
Seems, though, that the Fraser Health program is a deep, dark secret... If anybody reading this is interested, it might be worth a call to her office if you want a shorter wait until surgery. As for me, I'll wait.
I saw that, too, when I was looking to see if there's anything on the web yet about the Fraser Health bariatric program (if there really is one -- that is, the one that Dr. Zentner is supposed to be heading up). She has an article in there.
It looks interesting, and I'm bookmarking it for reading when it isn't so far past my curfew...
I'd be interested to know how your appointment with Dr. Zentner went. It's my experience that she's not very good with depression or other mental health issues.
I would recommend the Medical Weight Management Centre in Coquitlam (Dr. Michael Lyons), except that it's unlikely it would work for you coming from Kamloops. Might be worth contacting them for advice, however.
Good luck.
Those of you in the Fraser Valley, I encourage you to get a referral to the Medical Weight Management Centre in Coquitlam. I've been attending for a few months now (a whole day of travel for me), and it's a superb program. I expect it will help speed the process from orientation to surgery as well. They also have a post-surgery support group that meets once a month on a Tuesday night.
As for wait times, it used to be much faster to get into the Richmond program than into the Victoria program, but now that the Richmond program is well established, that has reversed.
And as I've said in other threads, I have no idea about the Fraser Health program, which it sounds like Dr. Ali Zentner is involved in. Because it's so new, it's probably way faster than the other programs -- if you can find out anything about it!
Yup. That's the Ali Zentner mentioned above. She left the Victoria program in April, I think, and is running this "Fraser Valley" program now, but I haven't been able to find out anything about it. Mind you, as my wait time is becoming shorter (I have been to Victoria but may hold out for Richmond) and Dr. Zentner and I parted on less than amicable terms, I'll stick with what I'm doing. And I really like the doctor (Dr. Pewarchuk) *****placed her and now runs the Victoria program. It's funny -- Zentner is a low-carb, high-protein, don't-worry-about-the-saturated-fat advocate, and Pewarchuk advocates for a vegan diet. I'll only say that Zentner's advice did not work for me.
Yes. I always phone. I know my doctor's clinic refuses to give out an email address...
Give it a few weeks -- at least 3 or 4. It can take that long for a referral to be processed, and you'll cause extra work both for the referring office and the hospital staff if you ask too soon.
For some strange reason, most doctors don't know about the program. I was told about it by somebody who had bariatric surgery in Victoria and was attending the MWM clinic for the post bariatric surgery group. When I told my doctor about the program, she didn't hesitate to refer me, but it was the first she had heard about it. I think, too, that it hasn't been around all that long -- that it is still in development and has grown a lot in the past couple of years.
The trouble with most of the protein drinks out there is that they don't have enough fibre in them. The PGX shakes are basically a conduit for fibre... with protein along for the ride. I haven't tried them yet, but I plan to pick up a sample this coming week and see how it goes. I didn't fare well with the capsules when I tried them a few years ago, but apparently the shakes are easier on the GI system. I hope...
LOL! That ruddy filter for bad language slays me!
"...the doctor who referred you..."
I suppose the lesson to be learned from my experience is not to wait patiently for that phone call without getting some sort of confirmation from somebody that your referral did go through. It's not just about trusting your doctor (I will never go back to that doctor who promised me the referral -- for that and for other reasons), but sometimes referrals get lost in the shuffle. There are three sources you can check: the office of the doctor *****ferred you, your GP's office, and the hospital itself. They all would have some record of the referral having been received, and with the latter, you can also get a very rough idea of the time remaining that you have to wait.
That wait-times website is incomprehensible! I think perhaps that things are different with bariatric surgery because with most other surgeries, the referral to surgery is your "clearance" whereas with bariatric surgery you still have a bunch of hoops to jump through to determine that you're "ready" for surgery. So that adds an extra step that the wait-times site doesn't take into account. That's my theory, in any case.
It's my understanding as well that there's absolutely no way to speed up the time from referral to orientation; however, if at the time of orientation you are considered to be well-prepared, especially if you have comorbidities, that can speed up the process from orientation to surgery considerably. I've heard of somebody getting surgery 2 months after orientation in Richmond. (Mind you, with Victoria, it's at least 6 months for anybody.)
In any case, it's well worth preparing yourself before getting that phone call!
If you live in New West with a spouse who can support you through the process (especially the surgery and recovery part), it would be CRAZY not to do it in Richmond, all other factors aside. Definitely worth the wait.
And in the meantime, I highly recommend the Medical Weight Management Centre in Coquitlam (Dr. Michael Lyons). I wish I had known about it years ago. It is excellent preparation for bariatric surgery as well as potentially an effective program to help you lose weight without the surgery. It's comprehensive, well presented, and done in a very respectful and supportive way. And it's covered by MSP. The only problem with it is that you have to get there: The group sessions (which are more or less every week for a year or so) are at 5:00 or 6:45 -- in other words, you need to travel to Coquitlam during rush hour. But it's worth asking your doctor for a referral.
Good luck! And maybe check out PGX supplements, too: https://www.pgx.com/ The meal replacement shakes, in particular, are a big part of the program for many of the MWM patients and far superior to Optifast if you've ever had the misfortune of imbibing that stuff.
Hi Dyani,
Sorry to hear that you had the lapband and that it hasn't worked out for you. And I can't answer your questions, but I'd suggest that you ask on one of the main boards because there's so little activity here on the BC board.
Not sure, either, why you're asking in particular about Dr. Amson, as there are another two (I believe) surgeons now on the team in Victoria, as well as those in Richmond. I haven't yet met Dr. Amson, but most reports are that he doesn't have the "best bedside manner."
I'm curious why your doctor likes the program in Victoria. Even aside from the travel, I personally think it's much less patient-oriented than Richmond from the communications I've had and the orientation I attended in Victoria as well as anything I've heard by word of mouth.
Do call. You don't want to find out a year later (or worse, longer!) that the referral didn't go through and the waiting time (this was Richmond) is now a year longer than it was when you requested the referral. (Ask me how I know to offer this caution...) And feel free to ask questions. It's the receptionists' job to answer them, and in my experience, they are friendly and helpful.
And yes, there are programs you can do in the meantime. Dr. Lyons in Coquitlam has one, and he works with anybody in the province, even if you can't get in to Coquitlam for all aspects of the program.
And track your food. They like that. (At least for the Victoria program.)
And I had my orientation on June 28. Or maybe I should say that I attended a very rushed PowerPoint presentation that left me glad that at least I had a fun little holiday in Victoria...
Have either of you looked into Dr. Lyons' medical weight loss clinic in Coquitlam? Unfortunately he's connected with Richmond, which now has a much longer waiting period than Victoria, but his program sounds very good whether you ultimately have the surgery or not.
Try to talk him into referring you anyway. You will have plenty of time to decide if you want to do it (or to get talked out of it) -- the wait list for Richmond is now 3 to 4 years!
Victoria now has a shorter wait. And I keep hearing rumours about a "Fraser Valley" program but have no details whatsoever about it.
Would very much like to know more. Has she really left the Victoria program? And what is this new program??
Kathy S. · 0 replies · 1075 views
