Kelly K.
Hey all.. I started this journey in September, when my daughter, Michelle, had rny with Dr. Mueller from Scripps in San Diego. I really never gave it a thought to get wls because didn't know really how to go about getting it, until the daughter decided to do it for herself..funny, huh?? She's 23 and living her life, so proud of her!!
So anyway, went to Dr. Mueller's wls seminar, and found a lot of information, but the insurance they take wasn't mine, so I had to find others in the area that took Tricare Prime. So, I went to another seminar that did take Tricare, and that was Pomerado and Dr. Callery. Before they would see me for an eval, I needed to get authorization from my PCP. I could not see her until Oct. 19th, and hopefully she would give me a referral.
My PCP didn't have any probs giving me a referral. It took exactly 8 days to get someone to call me back and tell me they have authorized me. But, instead of going to a civilian dr., they referred me to Balboa Naval Medical Center.
I finally received a date for the surgeons evaluation on November 26. I saw Janos Taller. I liked him immediately! He asked me quite a number of questions, and I had filled out a questionaire from the surgery clinic before I even got there (downloaded a pdf file..:)).. He asked me more questions and then told me I was a good candidate for wls (woohoo!), and that I would be able to have surgery the first part of January.!!
I had to do some pre-op testing, and have done most of it! After he gave me the checklist, I started scheduling appts, and some were walk-ins.
The first appt I had 2 days after the eval. It was the Psychological evaluation, piece of cake. The next was the following week, when I had a day off, and it was bloodwork (10 vials!!), urinalysis, the educational class (1 of a series of 3), then I did an ekg (walk in appt as long as you have a request from the Dr.). this was done on 12/5.
The next set of appts are on 12/12. I will have the 2nd ed. class, upper g.i. at 8 am, chest xray and the Nutrition consult (and there are 2 more f/u appts. needed). That's all she wrote. Then supposedly a date for the surgery if everything looks fine and dandy...well...I'm hoping I know now, so I can schedule my vacation time (I have pretty much 3 weeks off...!)
