J's Surgery

A few weeks ago I tried to start a second blog about J's upcoming lapband surgery but realized that I barely have time to maintain this blog and answer all of your posts and questions, so nixed the idea. But things have been kind of stressful and crazy around here in anticipation.

See, in order to have lapband surgery, there are many hoops to jump through (much more than I could have ever imagined, and so many more than for a hipscope!) He finally attended a seminar given by the surgeon, obtained 6 months of medically supervised weight loss, saw a psychologist, saw a nutritionist, had a physical, saw the NP at the surgeons office and finally met with the surgeon. This over a course of 17 months. (I remember going to the seminar with him on crutches).

Part of the drama has been dealing with a semi-incompetent surgical coordinator at the surgeons office (who definitely hates me). At the time that we scheduled the surgery, she thought we would have a problem since J's 6 months of documented weight loss did not have an entry for the month of March, rather one at the end of Feb ad one at the beginning of April. Imagine waiting that long, and going through all of that to be told that this tiny little glitch would bring this entire, delicate house of cards crashing to the ground.

Being that I have assumed the role of "project manager" with his surgery, I quickly (and quite hysterically) called the insurance company to straighten it out. I was told that this indeed may pose a problem, but they would do their best to get this approved. The next day I received a phone call telling me that the surgery would be approved! YAY!!

When we left the surgeons office, we were given a packet with instructions (that the coordinator hastily went over with us) but were rather unclear and quite confusing. J had to have his medical doctor fill out some paperwork approving him for surgery which he was to take to the pre-admission testing. Pre-admission testing would fax it to his medical doctor who should fax it to the surgeons office. Retarded? I think so!

This past Tuesday I received a call from the woman in charge of collecting the aforementioned paperwork, looking for approval from J's medical doctor for the surgery. I informed her that it was on page 22 of the fax that had been sent to them (I am not kidding about being "project manager"). Everything seemed like it was all set to go.

Friday morning (the final business day before his Monday morning surgery), the surgical coordinator called me and told me she was missing the medical clearance form fro J's medical doctor. Shit. I told her to look for that page 22 letter again. She informed me that this was not good because it was dated prior to the pre-op testing.

I hit panic mode, and yelling mode. How the fuck did they not realize until THE DAY BEFORE THE SURGERY that they were missing this quite important piece of information. J was having trouble getting through to the doctors office, I was yelling at the surgical coordinator in between patients. It was quite a sight. She needed the paper by 3PM. At 2:25 she did not have it, J was frantically leaving messages. At 2:28 the surgical coordinator called me and said that they would just go with the original letter they had. At 2:33 the fax went through.

So now we are 19 hours away from surgery. Unlike me, J is not frantically cleaning closets or getting a mani-pedi! I will keep you updated!