Health committee  That's an excellent question. As for red tape, the biggest challenges were in the initial building, the nine months it took to make sure the building codes, fire codes, elevator codes were in line with the City of Barrie and building standards. Then it was making sure, specifical

Health committee  I attended French school in Egypt, but in Barrie, there is not a lot of French. If you don’t mind, I will answer in English.

Health committee  The answer to the first question is, yes, it is totally Health Canada and FDA-approved. The answer to the second question about the balloon is it stays in for six months. There are balloons now being developed that could stay in for up to 12 months. But it comes out. So the chan

Health committee  That's an excellent question. I think that's pivotal to the whole concept of out-of-hospital facilities. Initially when I started the project I was very altruistic, and I really wanted to do the whole scope of general surgery. Then the sobering reality hit me that from the stand

Health committee  We looked at our data for hernia procedures, and we found that our results, for an out-of-hospital facility, were better. We looked at it objectively. A medical student studied our results, and we found there was a slight decrease, for example, in infection rates and other outcom

Health committee  First of all you need to be a board-certified general surgeon to do this procedure. It's done laparoscopically, so with a minimally invasive surgery. We have some of the basic skills, but because it is a new procedure, we are mentored by a surgeon who has performed over 1,000 of

Health committee  I am the primary owner, yes.

Health committee  Yes. It was funded...and it was an ambitious project.

Health committee  Correct.

Health committee  That's an excellent question. I was looking for one person to coordinate the whole project, but unfortunately there isn't one coordinator who exists to lead the whole design of an advanced surgery facility. I went to guidelines that had been established over the last 20 years

Health committee  Absolutely, and I didn't want the message to get lost in obesity. I think both are important. I was using obesity as a model to say that out-of-hospital facilities can actually function quite safely and have great potential to save taxpayer dollars. I think that's a key message i

Health committee  You bring up an excellent point, but to reverse obesity with exercise and diet alone is virtually impossible. From the studies that show us it can be done, usually 1% or 2% of the population can keep the weight off after two years.

Health committee  The lap band has variable funding across Canada. Alberta funds the lap band. Quebec funds the lap band. The challenge, though, is the amount of funding required to fund a procedure like the lap band, because it really is a chronic condition. It requires very intense follow-up and

Health committee  Speaking personally, there haven't been any issues raised with the efficiency of approving the lap band as a medical device. It was approved initially by Health Canada in the late eighties. In 1993 the first laparoscopic, or less invasive, procedure was carried out. The band ha

Health committee  For the lap band, there's no evidence that Health Canada has been slower at approving it than in Europe and the United States. We actually just came back from Mont-Tremblant, where we had a lap band meeting. The actual innovator of the lap band was there, and we had a dialogue