Old Person Rant (Young Persons Need Not Enter)

[JHelms]

My family doc is always bugging me once or twice per year to make an appointment so I humor him because his kids need to eat too. So I make an appointment for 10:00 a.m. because I figure that will give me plenty of time to do my old person stuff in the morning and still make the appointment. Almost immediately the texts and emails begin bombarding me with "read this" and "check that" and "update this information".

Then two days before the appointment the text comes in to come to the office 45 minutes prior to your appointment to update your medical history and prescription history with the assistant. Screw you. If I wanted to come in at 9:15 a.m. that's when I would have made the appointment.

Appointment cancelled and re-scheduled for one month from now at 11:00 a.m. I hope I'm still alive.

[DURASPANK]

Be glad you're not there to see him so often that they don't need new info.

[mastergun]

My family doc is always bugging me once or twice per year to make an appointment so I humor him because his kids need to eat too. So I make an appointment for 10:00 a.m. because I figure that will give me plenty of time to do my old person stuff in the morning and still make the appointment. Almost immediately the texts and emails begin bombarding me with "read this" and "check that" and "update this information".

Then two days before the appointment the text comes in to come to the office 45 minutes prior to your appointment to update your medical history and prescription history with the assistant. Screw you. If I wanted to come in at 9:15 a.m. that's when I would have made the appointment.

Appointment cancelled and re-scheduled for one month from now at 11:00 a.m. I hope I'm still alive.

I'm with you. What irritates me even more is the medical communities general attitude of self-importance. I don't expect to wait 30-45 minutes AFTER my appointment time to be seen. My time is equally important as theirs, don't waste my time. If you can't handle the workload in a timely fashion, reduce the number of appointments you schedule. I won't hesitate to let them know when they waste my time. I think they sometimes forget that medicine is a service business.

[ColdSVT]

God forbid you have you info updated wt the appt time so you can avoid being delayed


Every minute an appt is delayed because the pt wasn't prepared adds several minutes to each appt after...and that's why they run hrs late in the end of the day

[nc370v]

Annnndddd....
Insurance dictates what medicines you can take....not the doctor!

Since we were ranting.

[JHelms]

I'm with you. What irritates me even more is the medical communities general attitude of self-importance. I don't expect to wait 30-45 minutes AFTER my appointment time to be seen. My time is equally important as theirs, don't waste my time. If you can't handle the workload in a timely fashion, reduce the number of appointments you schedule. I won't hesitate to let them know when they waste my time. I think they sometimes forget that medicine is a service business.

Amen. My wife (bless her heart) walked out of her doctor's office after waiting 45 minutes. To their credit, his office call later and apologized.

[ColdSVT]

Annnndddd....
Insurance dictates what medicines you can take....not the doctor!

Since we were ranting.

No...insurance dictates what you can take for free or cheap...not what you "will" take

[SC Bullet]

You can thank Obama for that. He started the domino effect with his health care ACT!

[ColdSVT]

I'd love to have some of you guys shadow me and see the reasons why it takes a month of sundays at the DR office or in the ED etc...we want to keep a schedule too...trust me

And those of us that work in healthcare bitch about you guys the same way yall bitch about us

It's a two way street

[pa.X19]

I'm not sure if I'm that old yet at 53 but I guess I'm lucky so far. My Dad's 80 and he told me 20yrs ago, Once they get their hooks in ya, look out!

[gaston13]

Good now you're teaching them a lesson. Don't mess with the blue hair crowd.

[fr8dog]

The folks at the VA are great!

[TRCM]

I've had doctors offices that have signs posted that state if you haven't checked in by your appointment time, your appointment will be cancelled and you will be charged 50 bucks.

I asked where my 50 bucks was when the doc hadn't seen yet and it was 30 min after my appointment time......they looked at me like I was crazy.

I said if you're gonna charge me when I am late, then I should have the right to charge the doc when he is.....and just like with if I am late, the reason doesn't matter.

[Rip Bass]

No...insurance dictates what you can take for free or cheap...not what you "will" take

Not really,my wife needed an MRI,her insurance said not yet and the MRI place would not sell her one for cash.

[Fishing Addict]

I’ve walked out after filling out the paperwork, etc completed before the scheduled appointment time and still waited an hour +. Then was charged for a missed appointment fee. Took months to get that reconciled. Only after showing up one day and paged back through the sight in log and proving that I was there long before the appointment did it get straightened out. Took 3 years to get that unpaid bill off my credit.

[bullet20vee]

I was born with one kidney and didn't know until I was about 23 or so. I did notice that I had a frequent urination issue when I was young. Years later my wife made me go see a Urologist and he gave me some smaples to take. Take on for a week, then try the next one for a week, etc. The first 2 gave me the worse case of heartburn I have ever had. I didn't even try the last 2 meds. When I went back for the follow up appointment, he asked me how they worked. I told him about the heartburn and he said that was just a side effect and he could give me another script for that. I asked what would be the side effect for that and how many meds would he end up prescribing me. I left and I still just pee alot.

[local16]

You can thank Obama for that. He started the domino effect with his health care ACT!

You must be rich. What do you show for an income last year?

[gehol]

Amen. My wife (bless her heart) walked out of her doctor's office after waiting 45 minutes. To their credit, his office call later and apologized.

30 minutes is my max for waiting. I have walked out more than once. Got tricked once. Went to reschedule and suddenly it was my turn. They put me in a room and ignored me for 20 minutes. Had a polite discussion with his nurse and left. I have no problem with an occasional reschedule.
I am old enough that my stuff don't change. I ask for my current info so I can copy the "few" things that did not change. I scratched through the date, put current date and hand it back to them.

[rboren]

Doctors time = valuable/. Your time = cheap! Most of the doctors I have to see are not that bad. I have been to a couple that I will not go back to because evidently they are slower than I am!

[pa.X19]

Isn't it usually the guy ahead of you that slows everything up with the Q&A session?