William Yates, M.D. Bariatrics Bariatric Center

I first met Dr.Yates 5/12/01 to go over my pre-op test results. I also met with his assistant Cathy and enjoyed her. Dr. Yates
didn't really have much to say. I didn't have to wait like I had read that I might. I guess I just got there at a good time. I have my surgery date of 5-24-01. The Dr. did say that I would start feeling like walking and doing more in about three months. I can't wait for that. My overall impression of them so far is good. I will know more later.

My husband and I were very impressed with Dr. Yates. He spent alot of time with us and answered every question to our satisfaction. He seemed very caring, but professional, and also laid back which is something we appreciated as we are kind of laid back people ourselves.

His office staff is S-L-O-W!!! We saw the doctor Feb. 5 and have been waiting ever since for the paperwork to even get to the insurance company. We started calling every day, though, and eventually we did get sent in and approved. I do want to mention he moved his office during this time and the program they used, Weight For Life, dropped them and they had to get all their paperwork to New Start. Maybe not ALL of the slowness was was their fault.

To me, surgical competence is most important, however I've had surgeons who had poor bed side manner and surgeons who could have been members of my family they were so great--and the good ones were better!

I first met Dr. Yates, and his partner at that time Dr. Kevin Mitchell, about 2 1/2 years ago. Mitchell was nice enough and seemed qualified, but Dr. Yates' personality seemed to mesh better with mine. I was not approved for the surgery at that time, so I saw him again in Jan. 2001.
He is very tall, good looking, and young. He has been doing these surgeries for several years, and comes across with a wonderful bed-side manner, and seems like a very competent surgeon. I have only heard wonderful things about him from his other patients. He is very encouraging and supportive. He is always very busy, expecially on Saturdays (sometimes the wait might be a couple of hours). I feel very comfortable with him, and he always makes me feel so good about myself, and acts like I am his only patient that day. He always takes time to see me, even once when I only stopped by to see one of his staff for nutritional information. He answers my questions, even though I know he has probably answered that same question hundreds of times for other patients, giving me credit for having a brain, and not talking down to me. He comes across as having a genuine concern for me and my problem without a sense of judgement or criticizing me for being a 'failure'.
I have had some problems with some of his staff, but I am not sure that it didn't have more to do with the fact that he had just moved, and everyone was very busy trying to catch up, and may have felt pressure and stress from that. I will be meeting with him again on May 15, after I have my pre-op testing done. I will also find out more details about the after-care program at the same time. I know he feels that it is very important to a sucessful long-term outcome, but there have been some changes since he has switched from the Weight for Life program to the NewStart program.

I had a very good impression of Dr. Yates. He seemed very nice and down to earth, and not at all intimidating. But he also seemed very competent, and made me feel very comfortable with him. The only thing that I didn't like was that many details about the surgery, or post-op were not spelled out to me. I found that for the most part, if I didn't ask, I wasn't told. Of copurse he did tell me during my consultation the risks of surgery, but details as far as my hospital stay, and diet were not volunteered. So when going to see him, I would suggest having a nice long list of questions to ask so that you don't forget anything.

I had surgery 12 days ago on 4/16 at Southpointe Hospital in St. Louis, MO with Dr. William Yates. I am a registered nurse and Dr. Yates had previously benn our Chief of Trauma and was highly recommended. The New Start Program at Southpointe was great, and my stay at the hospital for 4 days was uneventful. Dr. Yates staff are very friendly and he has a nurse practioner named Kathy who is great. Several of his staff have had the procedure and are living examples of this life changing surgery. He didn't really emphasize complications, and encouraged me saying I would do fine, which bothered me, because I know this is very serious surgery, and as a nurse, I had researched this and knew there are serious complications, but I knew the complications of having diabetes, hypertension, asthma, polycystic ovarian syndrome, were higher than having the surgery and that is why I chose to do it. I would rate Dr. Yates as an excellent surgeon and would recommend him to anyone. Both his surgical competence and bedside manner are great, and he's very handsome, which makes it all the nicer
!!!

My first impression of Dr. Helling was that he was well-informed and yet very busy. He has set one day a month aside for bariatric patients. I met with him for about 5 minutes, asked a few questions and then met with the scheduling clerk to talk over insurance. I had already gathered information about past diet attempts, letters of recommendation from my PCP and Internist and felt very prepared. However, they did not even look at them, they merely phoned the insurance company, received a denial and more or less said that was that.
My impression is that they have a very busy office and do not have time to do these battles. Therefore, I will move on and take my battle elsewhere, somwhere they are better prepared to deal with these issues.
11/15/00 - Had a consultation with Dr. Wm. Yates - St. Louis, Missouri. I've chosen him as my surgeon and feel very comfortable with that choice. His office personnel are very friendly and approachable I've decided to have the tummy tuck done at the same time. Hope to be able to schedule for late December. The best Christmas present I can think of!!!!02/23/01 I'm home from surgery on the 19th of February. Every day it goes a bit better. Dr. Yates was excellent, great skills, his nurse Cathy is very personable and encouraging. He tells me that everything went as planned, no complications. Would highly recommend him to anyone wanting a top-notch surgeon. Also, he's moving into a larger office the 1st of March. Yea!! his old office is tiny, tiny. You get 4-5 big bodies in there and Lordy!!
04/23/01 I have found Dr. Yates office to be very responsive to emergency phone calls. I suffered from black stool over Easter weekend and received a call back immediately.

I listened to Dr. Yates at a informational siminar. He is not overweight but was in no way superior acting. I feel that he is totally understanding. I am very impressed by him after listening to his presentation. The staff that was with him equally impressed me. All seem to be interested in the person and not the person's money. If I decide to have the surgery done, I feel totally confident in his skills and the follow-up by him and his staff. He has done over 400 of these operations. Experience in my estimation is always important. They highly stress after care and appear to have a well set up program. The only negative is that he is almost 300 miles away from me, but for his experience I will make the trips before and after.

04/12/01
Dr. Yate is one of the best Doctors I have ever known. It was one year today that I had my surgery. I still can't believe that i have lost 120lbs in a year. I remember when I first had the surgery. I really didn't think that it would work for me. But I had to try it anyway. At my 3 month post op the Dr. ask me did any one notice me getting smaller. I said not really. I knew my clothing was getting big but I really didn't see any difference in my size until I about 6 months and 98lbs lighter. Now I am 120 lighter. You know that people that I never knew paid attention to me asked me how did I lose so much weight? I told them what I did. So people look into getting the surgery. But I do let them know that this surgery has to be something they want to do. I also tell people that they need to research every aspect of the surgery. I didn't take this surgery lightly. I knew what I was getting into. I thank God I had the chance to do this surgery. If I had to do it all over again I would and with the same Doctor.
02/16/00
I thought Dr. Yates was a very nice man. Busy but nice. He answered all of my question and even drew diagrams to show me exactly what was going to happen. He didn't rush me off. Office staff was very nice also. he also express that after care was very important. I rate Dr. Yates as an 11 he is a great man.

I first met Dr. Yates at a Weight-for-life seminar. He was articulate, able to explain all aspects of the surgery at a level that all could understand, and very approachable. I have since met him once more and have my pre-surgery office visit on 04-25-01, the day before my surgery. The only glitch in dealing with Dr. Yates, came mid-stream when he un-affiliated himselp with the Weight-for-life program. Now he works with the New Start program. The transition went smooth and my paperwork was tranfered fairly effortlessly. I have met several people who had Dr. Yates as a surgeon, and they all were very pleased. I am comfortable with the process so far, he will be performing the surgery at South Pointe Hospital in St. Louis. It was important for me to use a physician that has done many bariartric proceedures (400-500) in a facility that has a dedicated special surgical unit for gastric by-pass surgery. I found both of those things with Dr. Yates, the only thing I wish is, that it was closer to my home. I live 350 miles away from where I am having my surgery.

I met Dr Yates March 3,2001 at a seminar
here in Kansas City. He was very informative
on the procedure he does. I would feel very
comfortable with him doing my surgery. My
husband was also impressed with him, he is very
confident and secure in his profession can't
wait. He let us know all the pros and cons of
the surgery. Makes you feel at ease and pulls
no punches with you, straight forward.