Would you do open IF you could choose lap?

I have a well respected DS Surgeon (Dennis Smith) down the road from me who does it lap.  But he was not on my insurance.

So, I went through my 6 months of pre-op with another well respected surgeon (Al Spaw) 6 hours away, who does it open.

BUT NOW my insurance will cover EITHER doctor.

What to do??

I have a relationship with Dr. Spaw's staff, but do I want open if I can have lap?

Also, do I want to be 6 hours away from my Dr. if I have complications?

Thanks!

I had lap DS, then with complication they had to open me up. I would definately go with lap as those wounds healed up with NO issues. I am having a horrible time with the open wound healing and may even have to have another surgery to open it back up and use a wound vac that I will have to haul around. I just think it has to be hard for anyone with any significant layer of fatty tissue under the skin to heal properly. Read my posts about wound if you want to see what kind of crap I am going through.

I will say that I have seen several posts with people very happy with open, but I am sure they will chime in. This gets asked frequently, so I would also do a search for older posts. T

I had a lap approach and am glad the surgeon was able to do it that way as I healed well. You should be aware that there is ALWAYS the chance that a "closed" approach could end up being "open" depending on your anatomy, past surgeries, adhesions, etc. I knew going into surgery that this was a possibility and was happy when I was told he had no difficulty doing it laproscopically.

I have only had experience with the lap. It was so seemingly noninvasive that I wouldn't have opted for anything else. I had five openings two have disappeared, two look like large freckles and the one around my belly button is not bad. I think that I was a lot less sore than I would have been otherwise and had a quick recovery.

I have had both,,, and absolutely no if you have a choice!

Good luck!

I was in virtually the same position as you.  I wanted Dr. Smith but he was not accepting any insurance the Fed. govt. offered at the time so I went with Dr. Maynard who does the DS open.  I checked with Dr. Smith's office right up till a week before my surgery to see if they had gotten things together with Wellstar yet but they hadn't.

If I had the choice, I would have hands down chosen Dr. Smith for a lot of reasons besides just the fact that he does the surgery lap even though I am very happy with Dr. Maynard and my surgery went fine and I am doing great.

So I would say, compare the pros and cons of all the things that are important to you.

Have you compared both surgeons? Number of DSs performed, mortality rates, complication rates, read patient reviews?

Have you compared the hospitals where you surgery would be performed?

Have you compared each surgeon's aftercare program? Who gives you the most bang for your buck? Who seems to provide the most follow-up? Post-op diet & vitamin instructions?

You get the idea. There is a lot to consider besides just lap or open and proximity to home is definitly an important one too.

Lia

Lia and are in the same boat - I was looking to go lap with Dr. Smith, but he didn't take my insurance so I went open with Dr. Maynard. (My surgery was one day before hers!)

As it turned out in my case, my insurance changed in the middle of my three month program and I could have switched to Dr. Smith but didn't and I am very happy with my decision.

My surgery was long, about nine hours, but relatively uneventful otherwise. My incision healed quickly and has left a fairly small scar considering how large of a opening it was. I was walking a few hours after surgery and resurmed semi-normal activity within a week, though I stayed out of work for three weeks.

Looking back, I stand by me decision to go with the open - there were so many other things to take into consideration in the end that the type of incicion didn't turn out to be one of the top criteria for me.

I had lap, so I would definitely favor it over open. 

I was very confident in my surgeon, who only does open surgery, and my insurance only covered open DS because they suck.   I was happy with open surgery for some reasons - I had heard lap DS can take a long time (one of my friends was out for 8+ hours for lap vs. the 5 or so I was out for open), and because my surgeon hand palpated my gall bladder and discovered it needed to come out, saving me another surgery down the road.  Since my GB was already in trouble but I had not had attacks, the open surgery was a blessing.  I'm glad I chose open but I definitely see a lot of pluses to lap as well.

FYI--Rabkin takes the GB and appendix out right away, via lap. My surgery was about 3 hours. I healed like a champ.

Nicolle