Bariatric Surgery Preparation – Orange County

Prior to your bariatric weight loss surgery at our Orange County office, we will give you some medical tests and help you change your diet so that you’re prepared for the lifestyle changes that are in store for you after your surgery. We will also make sure that you attend a bariatric surgery support group meeting as well as a nutrition class.

Once we have your surgery authorized and it’s scheduled then you will start working with the preop coordinator to schedule the remainder of your tests that need to be scheduled as well as attend a nutrition class. It’s also a requirement here for you to attend the support group. The support groups help you because you get to talk to other people that have had surgery, you can ask a lot of questions of patients that have already gone through the process. So, you can really learn a lot and get a lot of good ideas, also get a lot of your fear I think taken care of because one should see other people who have actually gone through it and really done well and heard their stories. It gives you a lot more confidence that you are going to do okay. Nutrition class is part of that. Also we suggest that you start taking iron preoperatively three weeks before surgery, stop taking any hormones or aspirin products two to three weeks before surgery. We usually ask you to start doing some of the behavior modifications that you are going to have to do after the surgery, like trying to work on eating slowly, making good food choices. There is a very vigorous preoperative testing that goes on including upper GI, chest x-ray, EKG, blood work, appointments with the internist, cardiologist, pulmonologist, and psychologist. All of that is usually done the first month right before surgery.