Eugene Kaplan, MD

OMG. I just read a review that read exactly like me and my surgery with dr.butcher. I have not been able to have sex or any NON PAINFUL SEX FOR 10 YEARS!!! That isn’t right!!! This is after 2 surgeries 6 «months «apart. It is impossible for me to have a bowel movement without manual using my hands to get the stool out. It does take around 30 minutes to have a bowel movement and must have at home. The yelling and screaming scares anyone at a public bathroom.
People told me this guy had died so I didn’t persuade a law suit. I have gone to many gyn doctors that know this man and have commented on how dangerous he is.
I can’t be fixed now either. I didn’t have any idea he was such a quack !!! My life is ruined!!! I hope enough warning has been made so no one else’s life will be ruined by this butcher…
PLEASE READ THIS OVER AND OVER AND OVER AGAIN!!!
ALSO HE WILL NOT TURN OVER RECORDS SO ANY OTHER DOCTORS CAN HELP ME. THEY NEED TO SEE WHAT HE DID TO TRY TO HELP ME.
I would gladly give my full name and number if it wouldn’t end up hurting me.
CJH

I saw Dr. Kaplan in August of 2013 for moderate to severe prolapses in the uterus, bowel and bladder. The initial consultation went OK, except it was rushed and I had to tell him that I had a bowel prolapse at which he sighed, put the gloves back on and checked. After 20 minutes he showed me an animation of what is wrong. He explained this would be a 6-​hour surgery. He then told me he would have to submit for Authorization and it would take a month. After 3 weeks, I called for status and they had not even submitted for Authorization! After another 6 weeks I had not heard a word! I called him with no answer, then I called the Insurance company and was told this was authorized two weeks after submitted! I was pissed. This medical condition affects quality of life and in severely uncomfortable at times. When I called the Dr. Office to schedule the appointment to set up the pre-​op, they blew me off for another 2 weeks. When I finally called and threatened them with complaints they made me an appointment, only to call me a week later and tell me they were no longer accepting new patients and that the Dr. was out on a medical leave and they didn’t know when he would return. That was complete BullSh*** because they were still open and practicing the following week. Watch out for this guy and his pipe dreams to milk the insurance!
Department of Managed Healthcare was contacted and I hope they fine him for unsatisfactory implementation of care!

DO NOT GO TO THIS HACK! This post is going to be on the graphic side, so if you don’t want to read the specifics, you may want to skip it. Unfortunately, it’s the nature of the beast with the procedure I had.
My surgery was in November 2013. Prior to surgery, intercourse was a little uncomfortable at times, but my real complaint was my rectocele, and it’s requiring me to manually evacuate my bowel. I know. Gross! When I was evaluated by Dr Kaplan, he told me that I pretty much had prolapsed everything. He said he could fix it all, and that my husband and I would be able to go back to the wonderful pre-​kids sex life. This surgery, (that was excruciatingly painful with a very poor job at pain control), has absolutely ruined our sex life. My poor husband gets pity sex, but certainly not lovemaking. I typically spend the time that I should be bonding with my husband doing everything I can to keep him from seeing me cry. It hurts that bad! DO NOT let him talk you into the mesh. He said that the complications women have are secondary to the surgical technique used, (transvaginal vs open through the abdomen), and that by doing it open, I would not have any complications. WRONG! My vaginal vault is not stretching, and the posterior wall where the mesh was placed is hard without any flexibility to it. It feels like a butcher knife cutting into me. Bowel movements now leave me in tears. It’s literally a 30 minute process that leave me sweating and crying in pain. I still have to manually evacuate, it’s just much more difficult, (I used to be able to insert my finger into my vagina to help things along, but now that is way too painful to do because my vagina vault is so tight). I now have to do gymnastics to have a BM. No I’m not constipated. The only way I can have a «natural» bm is to take enough Miralax or magnesium citrate to cause diarrhea. As if that wasn’t enough, I am now incontinent of urine. Yeah! Now to be fair, Dr Kaplan did warn me that by lifting my uterus back up, I may develop urinary incontinence. He said that would be no big deal. I could just come back and have the sling placed. As if I would ever let him touch me again!
And then to top it all off, Natalia, (the very rude Russian lady who answers the phone), can’t do math. She harassed me over and over about my not paying the bill, so I finally sent sent her the actual bank statements showing that all checks sent had been processed, and the bill had been paid in it’s entirety. Now she’s trying to say somebody else cashed one of the big checks. Instead of contacting the bank, she just turned me over to collections. The woman should have been calling to apologize for yelling at me and being so rude. Instead she sends me to collections. Really?
Clearly, I am an unhappy camper. I myself am a provider with 15 years of surgery under my belt. I get that there are complications, (I didn’t even get into all of the other sugical complications I had)! But the fact that he screwed up every aspect of this case is unforgivable. Yes, I have a lawyer.

Please do your own research before going underthe knife !
Per the Contra Costa Superior Court Website, Doctor Kaplan has been sued 7 times for Malpracice. This seems to be an exorbitantly high number.
See the link below:
And yes a Relative was a patient under his care. Caveat Emptor !

Stay away from this HORRIBLE dr! He is completely incompetent! He performs surgeries and then there’s «something wrong» on the follow up visit so that he can milk the insurance companies as much as possible. He is also one of the rudest and most unprofessional doctors I have ever encountered. He has had complaints and disciplinary actions from the medical board. Please do research and find another dr!

I went to see Dr. Kaplan for an extensive pelvic floor repair with a hysterectomy. I was quite young for the procedure (38) and very nervous. He was the most knowledgable and passionate doctor I have ever met. I felt confident and was in good hands. If you need major work done you have got to see him. No regrets. Teresa.
Update…I am having major complications post surgery recovery (3yrs later) and he is no where to be found.

I had a hysterectomy, prolapse surgery and some other repair a few months ago. I was very scared about the surgery with having two small kids I wanted to make sure I was making the right decision as the surgery was not going to be a walk in the park. Dr. Kaplan took the time to sit down with my husband and I and draw pictures and explain every step. Also, showing us differnet scenios and what the out come would be. He was so pleasant and always returned my calls when I had questions. He explained everything and made sure I understood.
Dr. Kaplan is a very highly skilled surgeon that knows what he is doing. Everything he told me would happen did. He is honest and has a passion for what he does, you can tell. Once my surgery day came I was not scared I knew I was in good hands. My surgery took way longer than expected because I had more damage once he got in there. He was great about letting my family know what was going on. He visited me in the hospital and was there with me through the healing process answering questions and calling to check on me,
It has been three months and I am finally myself, I feel great, and I am so thankful I had Dr. Kaplan to put me back together, I was too young to deal with these problems. He is the best and I would recommend him to anyone.
Also, his office staff are so friendly and helped me through some ugly insurance matters. I felt as though I was family when I came to the office. They always had a smile, asked how I was and made me feel comfortable.
This office is the best!

I had a terrible experience with Dr. Eugene Kaplan. He treated me for pelvic organ prolapse with surgery that included a total vaginal hysterectomy, anterior and posterior repair w/​prolene mesh augmentation, vaginal vault suspension, and perioneoplasty. I have experienced constant pain since Dr. Kaplan’s surgery and am in much worse condition after his treatment than I was from the underlying prolapse. So far I’ve have had two additional surgeries at UCSF to correct problems he caused. I’m still in daily excruciating pain, especially during and after sex. Some specifics:
1) Dr. Kaplan left a sponge inside my body during surgery and did not discover the error until after the entire procedure was completed. He then undid surgery by removing the mesh, searched for the sponge using a probe, located the sponge in the abdominal cavity where it had traveled, and then redid the entire surgery. What should have been a 3 hour procedure turned into an 8 hour ordeal. My body took quite a beating and I had to have a significant blood transfusion. Dr. Kaplan never apologized or even acknowledged that what had happened caused me to have a much more difficult recovery.
2) Dr. Kaplan was not forthcoming with me about the source of my pain after surgery. He repeatedly examined me, claimed he could not «see» any problems, and declared the surgery a success. But pain from mesh anchoring points is not something that can be visually observed. The pain is reproduced by pushing on the anchoring points, a fact Dr. Kaplan well knew as a surgeon in this field. It was not until my ob/​gyn told him she was referring me to other doctors for the pain that Dr. Kaplan admitted the vaginal mesh was causing the problem.
3) Dr. Kaplan caused permanent nerve damage to my perineum with his poor stitching after the surgery. I suffer a great deal of pain in the region during and after sex, while riding a bike, and even sitting. Dr. Kaplan’s suggestion for solving the problem was to inject the perineum with alcohol to kill the nerves there. Three other doctors told me that such an injection would be very painful and is not supported by scientific studies.
4) If you are not planning to have more children Dr. Kaplan steers you toward hysterectomy with vaginal mesh repairs. He is a big proponent of vaginal mesh and is trying to patent and sell his own mesh system. But he anchors the mesh to more locations in the pelvis than other doctors (6 as opposed to only 2 – 4). I’ve felt like someone has inserted a knife in my vagina since Dr. Kaplan’s surgery. The mesh pulls on ligaments and causes pain. Vaginal mesh causes many other problems. See e.g.
.
5) Dr. Kaplan recommended a hysterectomy, which I now seriously regret. Hysterectomy has a number of potential negative side effects that Dr. Kaplan will not discuss w/​you (e.g. earlier menopause, diminished orgasm, etc.). Check out potential negative effects at
. And there is no evidence that prolapse surgery is more successful with hysterectomy than not. Dr. Kaplan’s approach of removing the uterus is very primitive. The more advanced method is to preserve the uterus and just strengthen the supports. See e.g. the approach of Dr. Eric Sokol at Stanford:
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6) Dr. Kaplan does not have a clean record. The California Medical Board cited him in 2005 for using a medical procedure he did not have the clinical privilege to perform and for not following regulations for altering a patient’s medical record. See his record at
. On this basis, the State of Illinois refused to renew Dr. Kaplan’s medical license:
. He can no longer practice medicine there.
7) Dr. Kaplan’s surgery has been a disaster in my life. Please take the time to explore other options before signing up for treatment with him. I recommend Dr. Sharon Knight at UCSF and Dr. Eric Sokol at Stanford. They are both excellent and much more skilled in treating prolapse than Dr. Kaplan. Good luck.

I was diagnosed with a large fibroid in my uterus so I was in hunt of a good doctor. My husband and I are big review people so after reading Dr. kaplan’s reviews I knew he was the person to see. When I first called his office his staff was really good about fitting me in since it was an emergency base. His location is office is pretty easy to get to, right across the street from John Muir-​Walnut Creek. My appointment was at 9am I wasn’t seen until about 30 minuted later but it was worth the wait! Just like another review on here.Dr. Kaplan is worth the wait! He’s very smart, very easy to talk to, you could tell that he really knows his stuff! He was also able to find a second fibroid that my other doctor missed. Dr. Kaplan really cares about his patients. He takes the time to sit with you and explain what you have and what he plans for you. He even ordered a STAT MRI for me the day I visited him and scheduled me for surgery right away. Since everything was happening so fast I still had some questions that I forgot to ask during my visit, so I called his office and Dr. Kaplan’s phone number is listed on the message line. I like how I was able to call him anytime of the day, so that was a big plus! During my surgery Dr. Kaplan took the time to make sure everything was in place, he even checked my fallopian tubes to make sure I can have a future pregnancy. It is now 3 days post my procedure and I feel great! I give Dr. Kaplan 5 stars and he deserves it! I would recommend him to my family and friends, so if your in the hunt for the best doctor he is the one to see!

Dr. Eugene Kaplan repaired a fistula in my bladder. The experience was challenging but I always felt in very good hands. Now I am back and feeling 100%.
He is extremely knowledgeable and specializes in pelvic uterus-​gynecology and you can see he has passion for it. He took the time to explain in detail the diagnosis, options and everything else in a very clear and illustrative way. This helped us to understand better and we never felt rushed. From the moment he treated me, I felt like I was in good hands. He came to visit me every day after the surgery; even the weekend! He is kind of the old fashioned, caring and committed doctor you often don’t find nowadays. I highly recommend him. His talented staff helped me go thru the transition too. There was always a smile and they were very helpful. Thank you Natalie, Carmela, Irene and of course, Dr. Kaplan!
Blanca

I had a hysterectomy and prolapse surgery done two months ago by Dr. Kaplan. It is a huge relief to be able to stand and walk again without discomfort. Everything is working well again! I am so grateful to Dr. Kaplan and his excellent staff, Carmela and Nataly!
Dr. Kaplan who is a specialist in utero-​gynecology, spent over an hour explaining the upcoming surgery to me as well as drawing detailed pictures of what he would do in the surgery. He is using more advanced techniques than a regular gynecologist, and has a higher success rate for this procedure. He is a very sweet and caring doctor and I would highly recommend him. I will be forever grateful to him for giving me back a life in which I can walk and hike and enjoy my life again. If you are smart, you will go to him and forget about the other doctors think they can do this procedure. Dr. Kaplan sees a lot of patients whose previous surgeries have failed. You will not regret choosing him. He is the BEST!