The California Suregons

[Guest guest]

Tom & Nick,

I always enjoy a good conversation and respect both of your points of

view. Here is my 3 cents worth:

Dr. Rabkin:

Yes $11,000 is less than the cost for Dr. Baltasar + air fare, but

that pre-suposes that you have insurance approval. If not it will be

closer to $35,000 according to my sources. On the other hand Dr.

Rabkin/Jossart are the only ones in California with experience using

laprascopic equipment, though the procedure they do is lap assist,

not true lap.

Dr. Rabkin's staff has been a mess for well over a year now with high

turnover. It took them 3 weeks to send me out a pamphlet and they

would not set up an appointment until I had received said pamphlet. I

must say that whoever I talked to over there seemed to have about a

3rd grade education. Maybe it was a temp, I don't know.

If I lived in the bay area the convience and reduced travel costs

would somewhat offset the added cost of the surgery. If my insurance

were very generous and reimbursed say $4000 then it might be worth

the $7000 for the convience.

In my case I live in San Diego, and what I get with Dr. R is added

inconvience. I don't want lap that badly.

Dr. K:

I have the greateset respect for Dr. K. Although I am not his

patient, he has treated me very well. We have shared correpondence

regarding insurance denials, and he was kind enough to send me a

bariatric pillow (which I acepted) and the $100 check (which I am

returning). Dawn is very nice as well. It seems to me that going to

Dr. K is somewhat similar (but to a lesser degree) then going to Dr.

Baltasar. [by the way, Dr. B's 2001 report only talks about 125 DS

cases, so I don't understand the quotes of 1000 that have been

bandied about.] You get less up to date equipment, but much nicer

hospital staff as well as nicer office staff. It is sort of the

antithesis of going to see Dr. Gagner and staying at Mt. Sianai.

Dr. K does charge the $2000 program fee. This fee is quite reasonable

if you can take advantage of this program, but I doubt that I would

personally be able to given the 6-7 hr drive from San Diego.

For some reason Dr. K is not a prefered provider for Aetna, so that

kind of ruled him out for me.

Having said that, if I do have to self pay, Dr. K will be near the

top of my list, as the self pay costs are rumored to be about

$25,000 - lowest in California. Now compare that to about $15,000 to

go to Spain (including airfare etc). Personally I will pay the

$10,000 to stay here in the US.

Dr. Anthone:

Dr. Anthone accepts Aetna and he does not charge a program fee. He is

also the closest surgeon to San Diego. So cost and proximity were

major factors. The fact that all his patients love him helps out

quite a bit, though the same can be said for the other guys. If I am

approved for insurance I will have to pay a grand total of $500! On

the other hand the only report I have heard regarding self pay was in

the range of $42,000, and Dr. A has a general policy that he does not

do self pay (he and USC obviously make special occasions).

I will say that the staff of Dr. Anthone's office, while much better

than Dr. Rabkin's is not in the same leauge as Dr. K's. Angie,

, and nn are all nice when I talk to them, but the do NOT

return phone calls (not even once in the 4 or 5 times I have left

messages for them). Why bother having voice mail if you are not

going to listen to it! Angie did not answer my e-mail and

answerd my first e-mail, but has failed to respond to my 2nd and 3rd

e-mails.

Dr. Anthone doesn't type his own e-mails (don't want to hurt those

suregons fingers) and has Angie type them. Unfortuantely, Angie

failed to get Dr. Anthone's e-mail to me.

So will I jump ship and go to Dr. K? Well, not at this point. Dr. A

is more convienent, lower cost for me, and more experienced.

However, I am a fairly low risk patient (BMI=44, no major health

problems) and would feel comfortable with any one of these 3

excellent suregons.

Oh - I failed to mention Dr. Crooks and Dr. Jossart, the protoges. I

don't know much about Jossart, but Dr. Crooks patients seem to love

him. Is he as good as Anthone, I don't know. He has shown the ropes

by Anthone and he is an excellent suregon in his own rite. However,

he has done only 50 DS suregeries. He does have Anthone and the whole

USC staff to back him up if thier is a problem. Still when they asked

me which one to go with I asked for Anthone without hesitation. Just

though I would go with the veterun. Plus, Crooks only does 1 or 2

surgeries a week, so his wait list is now as bad or worse than

Anthone's.

In principle I agree with Tom that the suregon's skills are what

matter most, but other factors played a significant role in my

decision. Would I go to a clearly inferior suregon to save money or

time - no. Would I go to a slightly less experienced suregon if it

was more convient and lower cost - yes - in my case I would. On the

other hand if your BMI > 60 you should stick with only the most

experienced suregons out there.

Just my 3 cents worth (a penny for each surgeon).

Hull