With Lap-band only weight loss is not covered
October 18, 2004
Reported By Dr John D'Arcy
Lap-band advocates say the procedure not only saves lives – it saves the health system money in the long run. But governments won't cover the cost.
They call themselves the 'Lap-band club'. Together, four friends have lost 200kg.
But they faced financial hardship in paying for stomach Lap-band operations – the latest treatment giving hope to the obese. The treatment is scarcely available in public hospitals, while privately it costs up to $16,000.
Melina Mastronardo was aged just 36 and weighed 130kg
when her doctor warned she was heading straight for
a heart attack. Having battled a weight problem all
her life, Melina would lose
weight on a diet but put it back on later.
"I've had my teeth wired, my mouth shut closed so I could only have fluids, I've had a balloon inserted into my stomach that cuts down the intake of food," Melina explained. "I've been on every diet known to man: Weight Watchers, Jenny Craig, everything."
Two years ago Melina's doctor prescribed a Lap-band to save her life. But Melina had no private health insurance, so faced paying the entire $16,000.
"I tried to get it through a public system," Melina said. "There was no way – the waiting list, you'd be dead by the time you got to hospital."
Fortunately Melina's father helped her pay for the operation. Today she's lost 50kg and says she feels fantastic.
David Pascoe weighed 120kg. His life insurance company had just deemed him a heart attack risk and wanted to cancel his policy. David decided to get a Lap-band.
"The biggest concern I had was the shock when he told me the cost of it," David said.
He couldn't even get a bank loan for the procedure. Eventually David put $8,000 on two different credit cards and four months later he's lost 20kg, with more to lose.
But David is still paying off the credit cards at 18 per cent interest.
"There was an option of 'go into debt, do it yourself and pay for it'," David said. "Or in my case, become fatter and fatter and fatter and probably end up having a lot of complications later in life."
Today Tonight contacted the ministers for health in each state. They all proudly proclaimed the Lap-band procedure was available in some hospitals – except Queensland, where it's completely unavailable.
But when questioned on the number of such operations every year, the top figure ended up being just 30 at a Hobart Hospital – a small number when you consider 400,000 Australians (one-in-five) are clinically obese.
Lap-band surgeon George Fielding has done 2,500 operations. Most are private patients – he'd do more in the public system but isn't allowed.
"I think it's really weird that we will treat all other addictions, people will wear all sorts of badges to say they're proud to be caring for all other addictions whatever they may be," Dr Fielding said. "But fat people just don't get a look-in and they're the sickest."
Obesity costs Australia $1.3 billion annually in health care, not to mention the diabetes it causes. Each obese diabetic costs the government up to $16,000 per year. Dr Fielding claims the Lap-band operation wipes those costs out.
"It's a most satisfying thing to take someone who's not only fat, but really sick, on 10 or 15 different medications – the record I've seen is someone on 47 medications – and you take these people and within a year they're off everything," Dr Fielding said.
Andrew Frater was a diabetic for 17 years before he had a Lap-band two years ago. Today he's lost 110kg and his diabetes is cured. He says he's saving the federal Government $1,200 per year just in medication.
"It's a shock to me and also a shock to the doctor that I see," Andrew said. "The endocrinologist, he's quite astounded by it."
Dr Fielding is frustrated that there isn't any government assistance.
"There is no alternative here," he said. "People who don't have a mum or a dad that can give them the dough, there is no alternative for people who don't have that sort of credit card, there's nothing they can do."
Source:http://seven.com.au
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