Excellent Hernia Repair-- I'm Ready to Play Again Like Odell Beckham Jr !…read more In getting a flat repaired the tire had to be replaced and so I didn't wait but just brought it home from NTB to remount the wheel myself. The wheel didn't want to sit still as I screwed on the lug nuts and so I needed to hold it there. This took 2-3 minutes. I was squatting, slightly hunched over, and putting high pressure on my right groin area. I finally completed the job, hand-tightening all the lug nuts and lowered the car to drive off to work. The next day I experienced a groin pain while running outdoors. This recurred throughout the rest of the week. It always happened after significant leg exercise and too after long walking. While I initially thought it might be a groin strain, the persistence led me to believe it was an inguinal hernia. I performed the "cough test", visited Dr. Ash, and found out I was right. We elected to do the repair asap because my exercise is important to me. Note that if you wait too long the intestinal incarceration can worsen to the point of strangulation, and then you have an emergency visit to the hospital with a huge bill. By using a local outpatient surgery center (Stonegate on William Cannon), the surgery happened affordably and quickly. Now, a year later I'm in super shape from regular exercise. Mind you, I have modified that : I sold my racing bike and purchased an Elliptigo stand-up bicycle to avoid putting "Lance Armstrong-like crunch pressure" on the hernia site (Dr. Ash installed a plug under the mesh, so the former you can feel if you or some object pushes hard on your groin). The scar is quite feint, but I don't mind a "war wound". In recuperating from surgery I used no drugs because I immediately began walking around carefully with a cain. After about 8 weeks I was cain-free and fast walking with being able to half-speed run at 10 weeks. At 12 weeks I was back up to full speed, including rowing (a non-crunch exercise). Dr. Ash remarked that she had to install a plug that was significantly wider than she expected, so she believes my wheel replacement did *not* cause the hernia : I worked out in a gym throughout the 90's and probably started the tear there. Since then it only became worse and the wheel replacement took advantage of it to push the intestine up and through. Dr. Ash not only healed me, but enlightened me so I will henceforth live very differently so no hernia will happen elsewhere. My advice to anyone changing car wheels is always sit on a stool. And buy an Elliptigo.

Dr. Ash is amazing. Highly recommend. She repaired my mom's and husband's hernias. I had my…read moregallbladder removed last September and would not go to anyone else. The experience from initial office visit through follow-up was so professionally done. After one warning attack, and gallbladder removal, I am feeling great. I will admit, I could not miss my grandson's baseball game at 2 the next day, but I did take it easy the rest of the weekend, at work on Monday. She is so professional and explains everything. You are in trusted hands with Dr. Ash.

Dr. J Meynig did a hernia repair for me. 10/10 experience for my first surgery ever. The ladies in…read morethe office are all very sweet and helpful. From my initial visit to follow up visit, they made the process very swift and easy. Dr Meynig was AWESOME! Get in and see him before he hangs up his coat in August.

Dr Mark Glover performed hernia repair surgery on my husband & he was awesome from before, during &…read moreafter. He took the time to explain everything prior to surgery & we could tell he actually cared about his patients. We would recommend him in a heartbeat. He's a great surgeon/physician.

Dr Apostolakis did an upper blepharoplasty (an eye tuck) and earlobe reshaping for me a few weeks…read moreback. It was easy and problem-free, and I'm very pleased with the results. Dr. Apostolakis was engaged and responsive during the consultation, and it was an easy decision to go forward with him. He has a complete surgical suite attached to his office--so no day surgery clinic visit needed. His surgical assistant is delightful. In a preop appointment, she explained everything about the surgery and the post surgery care, and my recovery went very well. I would recommend Dr. Apostolakis to anyone in Austin considering facial plastic surgery.

I had Dr. A remove my hooded eyelids in October and I could not be happier with the results. The…read moreprocedure was quick and relatively easy as Dr. A and his nurse prepared me as to what to expect. Dr. A and his entire staff were very professional and attentive to all of my needs and concerns. My only regret is not having it done years ago! I highly recommend Dr. A for your cosmetic needs.

I have been a patient of this practice for several years. I've been seeing Dr. Amis recently for…read moremultiple issues with my hands and shoulder. He has been patient with clear explanations in walking me through the options. I have complete confidence in his ability to assist me in getting well as he has in the past. Calm demeanor and a good listener.

If you read reviews for medical providers, you'll see a common theme: doctors were great, office…read morestaff was horrible. That was certainly the case here. I have nothing but good things to say about Drs. Gallagher, Amis, and Barron. But the office manager left such a bad taste in my mouth I'll likely seek care elsewhere if I need another visit. One benefit of insurance is not just that insurance often pays part of the bill, but it actually lowers the total cost of the bill, because of the "contracted rates" agreement between the insurer and doctor. Our insurance is weak and doesn't cover office visits, meaning we don't technically qualify for contracted rates, but all our other providers give us the contracted rates anyway (probably reasoning that if the doctor were willing to receive $x as payment from an insurer, they'd be willing to receive the same amount from us). However, the office manager at ATX Ortho has seemingly decided on her own that ATX Ortho won't give the contracted rates, and doesn't care that that makes ATX Ortho stand alone in that regard. The initial conversation about my wife's bill went something like this: - - - - - OFFICE MGR: Your insurance doesn't cover office visits, so you don't get the contracted rate. ME: I know our insurance doesn't cover office visits, but all our other providers give the contracted rates for office visits, even though office visits aren't covered there, either. OFFICE MGR: But your insurance doesn't cover office visits! (groan) I went round and round on this, all I could get out of her was "Your insurance doesn't cover office visits!" - - - - - Today I saw Dr. Amis for myself and explained the problem with my wife's bill, including how all our other providers give the contracted rates even though they don't have to, and showed him the EOB with the Total Charged vs. Repriced amounts ($393.50 vs. $292.05). He didn't really want to know all the details (which is normal, he wants to leave administration to office staff so he can practice medicine), but said he'd be happy to receive the $292.05 repriced amount and directed the receptionist to honor that rate. So I paid, and asked her to submit my own office visit through insurance the same way. Then after I got home, the office mgr. called and again railed at me that our insurance doesn't cover office visits and she wouldn't give us the contracted rates. I protested that Dr. Amis had said we could get those rates, and she said that was just for my wife. I said I was sure that Dr. Amis meant it to apply to my bill also. She countered that my wife was "lucky" to have gotten the contracted rate at ATX Ortho (at other offices, we don't need "luck" to get the contracted rate, they just give it to us), and that she talked to Dr. Amis and he said to not give the contracted rate. I think she either didn't actually talk to him, or she did and misled him, more on that later. I asked her: "To be clear, if ATX Ortho doesn't give the contracted rate, it will be alone among all our various doctors' offices for not giving that rate, is this really the way you want to handle it?" She said yes. Since the decision to not honor the contracted rates is so unusual, I asked her where that policy was coming from, from her, or from the practice owners? Because it really seemed like it was coming from her. She said she talked to both Drs. Amis and Gallagher and it was their decision. I asked, when you presented the information to them, did you explain that ALL OUR OTHER PROVIDERS GIVE US THE CONTRACTED RATES? She admitted that she did not. Bingo. So, the doctors, who are not versed in the intricacies of insurance/billing, understandably deferred to their administrative staff, but their staff misled them by not giving them the whole story. I do want to point out that the *other* office staff has always been nice and helpful (e.g., Amber).

Dr Kroeker was recommended by our endocrenologist to remove my wife's thyroid. It was an excellent…read morerecommendation! Our initial visit was exactly what my wife and I needed - comprehensive explanation of my wife's condition, complete review of what would be done (including pictures and drawings!), answered all our concerns. We were not hurried through the process. And, the staff was very helpful and friendly. So far, so good. Then, came the surgery. Dr Kroeker came into the pre-op prep room and reviewed what would be done and any risks associated with the surgery. Including a chance for a condition called "hungry bone syndrome." The surgery was perfect and so was recovery. Only one overnight stay. And back home. The next day, my wife developed symptoms of hypocalcemia and Dr Kroeker immediately had us return to the hospital. My wife had hungry bone syndrome. The remedy is constant monitoring and IV calcium and other minerals. My wife's thyroid issue had depleted her bones and they were now sucking up all they found. For the next eight days, Dr Kroeker was in constant contact with the hospital. And, she visited my wife all the time. Throughout this condition and after my wife left the hospital, Dr Kroeker continued to stay in touch via phone, email and text. Today, 6 months or so later, my wife's incision isn't noticeable (unless you look hard). I can't be happier. And my wife is thankful for the care and attention by Dr Kroeker.

Be aware the lady who answered the phone diagnosed me on the phone and refused me an appointment.read more

It's your money!!! You would think... Mar.18, 2022 was…read moresurgery date. Today is Dec.1, 2022. Enough time has passed to have the accounting dept. mail the check that is supposedly on someone's desk since Oct. 21, 2022. I have always received a refund promptly from other medical facilities when deposit was overpaid but not from this one. Not kissing it goodbye tho!

Arise/Westlake kept our $8,000 hostage for 19 months!…read more Billing, billing, billing. Notice that almost all the bad reviews about Arise are about billing. When you go to Arise or Westlake Hospital, please never pay anything up front! They will tell you that they will bill insurance and if you overpaid, you will get a refund. But, that seems to never be true, based on reading the reviews here and based on our experience. (Arise handles billing and insurance for Westlake Hospital, we found out a year after a surgical procedure at Westlake). If insurance ever gets billed, and if you ever get a refund, it will only be after many calls and much work and nagging on your part. And, since you won't receive a bill from Arise/Westlake (because you pre-paid and nothing is owed), you will be in the dark about what the charges are, and you won't even know if insurance was billed or not because you don't know what the charges are! Did we get a refund? Yes, after 19 months of calls, emails, frustration, and visiting the Arise billing office in person, we finally got our overpayment of $8,000+ refunded to us. What went wrong? 1) Arise never even billed our insurance for the wrist surgery. They were not motivated to bill insurance because we had already paid them for the procedure. We finally got them to bill the insurance after a year of calling, and finally visiting the Arise office in person. We were extremely lucky that the insurance paid the bill even though it was filed slightly more than 12 months after the procedure. 2) Arise had to "approve" the billing of insurance for the procedure! What? Why? I don't know. Thankfully, they "approved" it, but I've never even heard of such. Billing insurance for a procedure should be automatic, right?? 3) When I called Westlake about billing the insurance, the person I talked to couldn't actually send a bill to insurance, and couldn't tell us if the bill had been sent. Why? Because she worked for Westlake. And, Arise handles the billing. This problem seemed completely insurmountable. We didn't know that Arise handled the billing. We didn't understand the problem. Finally, we drove to Westlake to talk to someone in person about billing, and we were told that we had to drive over to Arise instead. After talking to folks at Arise, we finally understood why it was useless to call the billing department at Westlake. 4) After Arise finally billed insurance, and our insurance fully paid for the procedure, we were then told "Your money is not refundable". Nobody ever wants to hear that. The person was wrong and they never should have said something like that. It would have been insurance fraud to not refund our money after they received payment for the same procedure twice (once from us; once from insurance). 5) After Westlake/Arise agreed to refund our money, it took almost 60 days to receive a refund check in the mail. This is in violation of the law in Texas which requires the patient be refunded their money within 30 days of recognizing that the patient is due a refund. 6) Fundamentally, there is a BIG BIG problem here. The billing of the insurance should happen automatically, and should not have required any phone calls or in-person visits. And, refunding a customer over-payment should occur automatically. Nothing ever happened without our interference. It is as though I was their unpaid employee working for countless hours on my own behalf. Without my intervention and numerous hours spent they would have done nothing at all. I can't possibly write about all the aggravation, frustration, and time spent on this problem. If we had taken no action, we would never see our $8,000 refunded for sure.

I highly recommend Dr. Glover if you are looking to have a hernia repair or a repair from a botched…read morehernia surgery that was performed by another surgeon. Dr. Glover gave my dad his life back. Dr. Glover was the only doctor, after seeing original surgeon several times, ER visits and two other doctors, that listened to him and acknowledged there was a problem with the nerve in that area. That nerve was damaged and caused excruciating pain leaving my dad bed ridden for 6 months. We read a review about Dr. Glover helping another lady with a repair from her botched hernia surgery performed by another doctor and Dr. Glover helped her tremendously. That review gave us so much hope and I hope we are doing the same for you if you are reading this and seeking help. We will be forever grateful and thankful to Dr. Glover. My dad is five months post surgery, those nerves are still healing, but he is 95% better. If you need help, please see Dr. Glover.

Dr Glover did postpartum hernia surgery on me and he was amazing. Professional, kind,…read moreunderstanding. I'd recommend him to anyone needing hernia repair!

This orthopedic office is always so busy that wait times are 30-60 minutes. The MD was…read morecondescending and didn't help me. I went elsewhere and found a great physician.

An absolutely brilliant doctor. Both the Lady and I are patients of his and due to all the HIPA…read morerestraints, I will just say that the many times regarding care are carefully thought out and he works hard to prevent surgeries. Many times we placed ourselves in his capable hands and came out more than satisfied. The is one of the best of the best folks. I would not hesitate to see him and pay out of pocket, even if the insurance we have did not cover.

I honestly couldn't be happier with my experience here. I came in needing disc replacement surgery…read morein my neck, and from the start the team made me feel taken care of. What really stood out to me is how quickly they got me scheduled, less than a week from my first call to surgery. That kind of responsiveness meant everything when I was in pain. The surgery itself went smoothly, and my surgeon explained everything in a way that gave me total confidence. The nurses and staff were so kind and attentive, making me feel comfortable during what could have been a really stressful time. Recovery has been going better than I could have imagined, and I can already feel such a difference. I'm grateful not just for the skill of the medical team, but also for how much they genuinely seemed to care about me as a person. If anyone out there is considering neck surgery or struggling with disc issues, I can say from personal experience , you'll be in excellent hands here.

Outstanding. Dr. Webb is a talented surgeon and he takes the time to answer questions and offer…read morereassurance.

Had a deviated septum. Dr. Bittar did my septoplasty was very thorough and attentive throughout my…read moreexperience and every follow up appointment. Although I hope to never have to go through a septoplasty again, I would not hesitate to go back to Dr. Bittar.

WARNING --- BEWARE. Do not go into surgery with Dr Anthony Bittar…read more He disfigured and deformed my nose by using outdated methods and making changes while I was unconscious that were not agree to. SEE BEFORE AND AFTER PHOTOS In 2024 I contacted Dr Anthony Bittar to repair a deviated septum so I could breath properly internally through my nose. A very simple procedure. He made a comment in our meeting "do you want me to remove the bump on your nose's bridge at the same time. Just to make it flat" That is all that was ever mentioned. "I will just slightly shave down that bump at the same time". He made it sound like nothing. I came out of surgery and he had completely changed the size and shape of my nose. He assured me it was just swelling and that would go down. After having 3 different respected surgeons inspect what he did. They all were shocked at his work and what he did without prior approval. 1) He excessively flattened the dorsum (bridge of the nose), resulting in an unnatural and concave profile. 2) He added cartilage to the tip of my nose--an unrequested change he later admitted to--which created a permanent large, bulbous appearance. 3) He significantly altered the overall size and structure of my nose All these things were decisions he made without my consent. DO NOT TRUST THIS MAN Read his reviews by sorting them by 1 star and believe them. He subsequently offered to 1) refund me half of my money 2) do the operation again and 3) install semi permanent filler in my nose. Total admission of guilt. All I refused. How could I ever trust him again. Once you are on the operating table he does what he likes. None of the above was ever agreed to. The whole time he gas lights with all his communication. I now have to go through the expense and pain of having surgery again to fix his horrible horrible work. I currently have complaints submitted to the Texas Medical Board, other malpractice entities and his affiliated hospital credentialing boards.