Georgia Coast Surgical e-Newsletter: August 2011
Even though I’m behind in getting out a newsletter, I wanted to hold off on writing this latest edition so that I could share some exciting news with you! After many months of planning and hard work we have just launched our new and improved Georgia Coast Surgical website. The folks at MDNet Solutions have done a great job in helping us design a new look that we hope you will find it easy to navigate and full of information to help you on your weight loss journey. Please check it out and let us know what you think at www.georgiacoastsurgical.com.
We are especially appreciative of all the patients that agreed to share their success stories with you. You may notice that they are all having fun with hula hoops and be wondering what that is all about. Our goal for all of our patients is to help them break the cycle of weight gain and loss of health. We encourage you to join in the fun and have your picture made with the hula hoops and tell your story! Next time you are in the office be sure to ask about how your success story can be featured.
In addition to our new website, we have also recently joined the social media set. We’re now on Facebook and Twitter, so please sign up and follow us. We hope that this will give us another way of getting out the news for our practice and also let people know who we are and what we do.
I’ve just started doing Lap-Bands in selected patients through two incisions. This is a modification of the single incision technique sometimes known as SILS (Single Incision Laparoscopic Surgery), SSS (Single Site Surgery), LESS (LaparoEndoscopic Single Site surgery) as well as other names. I’m starting out by making one incision about two inches long and another about a half inch long. Right now I’m only offering this to certain patients until I gain more experience with the procedure.
For those of you who haven’t heard yet, the FDA approved the Allergan Lap-Band for implant in patients with a BMI of 30 to 35 who have at least one co-morbid illness. If you know of someone in this category, ask them to give us a call. For now insurance companies won’t pay for these patients to have Lap-Bands implanted, but we have very good self pay alternatives. Janet has been working diligently to negotiate a better overall price for patients in this category with Premier Surgery Center.
We are also NOW offering a new procedure which relieves the symptoms of reflux and heartburn. This is an endoscopic procedure without scars known as Esophyx. For those patients who don’t meet the requirements for this procedure, I am still doing laparoscopic Nissen fundoplications. If you have family members or friends with heartburn and/or reflux, please ask them to give us a call or attend the seminars that we’ll be starting next month.
As the summer comes to an end, many of you will be busy getting children and grandchildren back to school. We hope that once you are settled in to your new routine, you'll be sure to take some time for yourself.
Harold L. Kent, M.D., FACS, FASMBS