Central Baptist Hospital Weight Loss Surgery Center
What to expect when you are ready for Surgery (Intake)
Once your insurance company requirements have been met (including your diet documentation requirements) you will receive a phone call to schedule a full day of appointments at the Central Baptist Hospital Weight Loss Surgery Center and Bluegrass Bariatric Surgical Associates. During this day you will attend a variety of classes and consults.
You will arrive in our suite at approximately 7:30 a.m. Please do not eat or drink anything after midnight on the day of this appointment, we will be drawing fasting labs. We encourage you to bring a snack to eat after your labs have been done. To test for the bacteria that causes stomach ulcers, we will ask you to blow into a small bag. You cannot eat or drink anything for one hour prior to this test.
Your nutrition consult is a requirement for surgery, everyone attends a nutritional evaluation and consult. During this session, our registered dietitian will talk to you about your eating habits, your diet attempts, and your nutritional knowledge. He/she will educate you about fats, proteins, carbohydrates, calories, food labels and portion sizes. You will receive sample menus and an individual diet plan. The dietitian will discuss food behavior with you and help you understand the importance of keeping a diet diary. We encourage you to bring your spouse or loved one to this consult, so they can support your efforts to eat a healthy diet.
You will also see one of our psychologists. You will be given a series of psychological tests that will be interpreted by either Dr. Perry Brown or Dr. Jennifer Scott. You will be interviewed by one of these doctors. The purpose of this evaluation is to determine your mental and psychological readiness not just for life-altering surgery but also for the behavioral and nutritional adaptations you will need to succeed. The psychologist will make a recommendation to the surgeon regarding your readiness to proceed with surgery or your need for continued counseling prior to proceeding with surgery.
Your final appointments on this full day at our Center will include a pre-operative class with one of our nurses, and our certified personal trainer. We will present the surgical options available to you in a manner that we hope will help you decide which procedure is best for you. Our trainer will talk to you about your fitness level, your physical limitations, and help you formulate a plan for pre-operative and post-operative exercise based on your needs and abilities.
You will rotate between our suite and the surgeon’s suite, located on the same floor of our building. When you are in the surgeon’s office, you will see a physician’s assistant and the medical technologist.
That concludes your first day of all day visits at the Central Baptist Weight Loss Surgery Center. Once you have completed this visit, the medical professionals you have consulted with will send reports to the insurance coordinator. This could take one week. When the insurance coordinator receives the reports, she will compile all the necessary documents and send them to your insurance company for approval. This could take as long as 30 days. Some insurance companies are much faster, some are not. The insurance company will give the insurance coordinator an approval number if you are approved. You can call the insurance company yourself to check on the progress if you like, but we will still need to verify the approval number to proceed to the next step. If you are denied, the insurance company will notify the insurance coordinator and you will be notified as well. You can discuss the appeals process with your insurance provider and our insurance coordinator.
Once approved, and the approval number verified, you will be scheduled for another appointment in our Center. You will see our Primary Care Provider, Dr. Jai Gilliam, who will perform a physical examination and a thorough medical history. Dr. Gilliam can discuss your post-op medications, but we ask that you confirm those with your own primary care doctor as well. Dr. Gilliam will provide the final medical clearance for surgery, or recommend specific tests prior to granting medical clearance. You will watch a consent video in the surgeon’s office and meet with the surgeon to finalize you surgical plan and sign the appropriate consent.
You will watch a pre-operative video specific to the surgery you will be having and you will meet with one of our nurses for specific pre-surgery education.
Your final stop on the pre-operative journey is with the scheduler in the surgeon’s office. She will schedule your surgery and any other pre-admission testing needed in the days before the procedure.
Now you’re ready for surgery!