Posted by noa on April 17, 2004, at 9:59:54
In reply to Soooo frustrated..., posted by Penny on April 16, 2004, at 11:21:49
Penny, I just had a frustrating doc office experience, too.
My insurance sent me a letter saying my doctor is no longer going to participate with the insurance and that I have to choose a new primary care physician.
I go online and look at the list of PCPs. I want a woman doctor. Almost all of the women in my area are not taking any new patients, or have retired or moved.
But I found one. I go to my first appointment, I figured I should meet this person I've now signed on as my PCP. Well, the doctor was fine. I liked her well enough. But the practice? Everything I hate about the way these multi-doctor managed care practices are. The waiting area was very noisy. The patients waiting were not the problem. It was the noise from the surround sound video, first of all. But even more so from the loud talking and laughing of the numerous clerks. It just seemed like such an unprofessional environment.
So I go in, walk up to the window. It is a BIG open window with a counter in front with the clipboards and forms, etc. Through the window is the office area where the many clerks work. I want to sign in but this patient is leaning on the clip board with the sign in sheet. She and a clerk are engaged in a somewhat intense discussion about a disagreement over the charges for her visit. Meanwhile, there are about FOUR other clerks sitting and standing there at the counter doing nothing other than listening and watching (with rapt attention) this disagreement unfold. (In the background are another bunch of clerks, mostly at computers).
Finally, I say "excuse me" to the woman and take the clip board and sign in. Since I can't seem to get anyone's attention behind the counter, I take a copy of a form there on another clipboard that reads, "Please list all your medications at every visit." Since this is usually a time consuming part of my visits to medical professionals, and since I can't interact with the clerical staff yet because they are still engrossed in the drama of this dispute going on, I figured it would be good for me to start filling out the medication form.
After a few minutes, a clerk calls me over and asks for my insurance card. As I give it to her I explain that the doctors name isn't on the card yet because I have just signed her up as my PCP. She brusquely replies that I can't see the doctor because she is not my PCP. I explain again that I did sign her up using the insurance company's online registration system, but I just had not received the new card yet. She tells me that I have to come back after I've called the insurance company and had them verify that this doctor is my PCP. I ask, is there any way they can contact the insurance company now to get that verification? She says, no, you have to do that. I say, ok, may I use your phone? She says, ok, give me your card. She dials the number and I get on the phone and this issue gets resolved and the insurance company faxes the verification. But the way this clerk handled this was so incredibly coldly and unhelpfully.
OK, so then she gives me the patient forms to fill out. I take the clipboard and forms and go sit down and start filling them out. I'm starting to feel distracted by all the noise in the room, and this is irritating me.
Meanwhile, a woman comes in and tells the clerk she is there for her 3 pm appt. with the same doctor. My appt. was for 2:45 and I was on time but the insurance snag took up some time. So, I figure, ok, they'll probably take her before me, but that's ok. I have plenty of time.
But Then, the clerk comes over to me and bends over me and into my space and takes the pen out of my hand and says, "I'm going to help you fill this out because they want to take you in now and you need to finish the first page of the forms before they do". The first page of the form is the insurance info. I'm already mostly finished with filling in this info already and I'm totally taken aback by how this woman is in my face and actually taking the pen out of my hand! But I tell her, no, that will be too distracting, just let me finish it myself. I'll be done in a minute.
Which I do, and I bring the page up to her at the counter. Then I sit back down and start the rest of the forms. A few minutes later, my name is called to go back. The medical assistant takes me back and says, I'm just going to triage you and then send you back out there again because Dr. so and so doesn't have any open rooms right now. So she does the weight, temp and BP back there and sends me back to the waiting room. I continue filling out forms for a while and then am called back again. At this point, it is fine--I sit in a room for maybe 2 minutes max and then the doctor comes in. She was fine.
But I'm still not done with the forms. I'd finished the med. history part of the forms but hadn't had a chance to read the policy forms, the financial agreement forms, or the privacy forms.
What is stupid about these, to begin with, is that each of these policy type forms has you sign at the end of it (sometimes one page, sometimes up to 4 pages) and then you are supposed to give it back to them--the signed form. But that obviously means you aren't taking the printed policy statements with you. How the heck are you supposed to follow their policies if you don't keep the forms? So, I asked for them to make a copy, but I'm sure most people don't go out of their way to request a copy.
But also, the forms are so patient unfriendly. First of all, they are like 1000th generation bad photocopies, some printed at a slant or with words cut off. And, they are rife with spelling and grammatical errors and typos. Not to mention that they ramble and offer confusing, conflicting statements in places.
For the HIPAA privacy policies, it's a bad nth generation copy of a template that they printed off the internet, and they haven't modified it to the specifics of their practice. The most obvious example of this is that at the end of the HIPAA privacy statement, it says, "if you have any questions about the privacy policies, the person you should contact is [BLANK LINE} who can be reached at [BLANK LINE]"!
And the way the HIPAA policy reads makes me feel like I am basically signing away ALL my rights to any kind of privacy. OK, so I know that this is a universal issue, not just this practice's problem. But, they have done NOTHING to give me the impression that they are going to handle my information professionally and to try to preserve my privacy or dignity and only share what they need to. By using a bad copy of the rambling, difficult to understand template from HIPAA, without putting any practice-specific statements on it about their intention to maintain privacy to the best of their ability, and by having such an unprofessional, chaotic front office atmosphere, and with the rather unhelpful approach of the clerk I dealt with, this does not instill confidence in me that they are going to treat my very personal medical information the way I wanted it to be handled.
Penny, I left there feeling frazzled and irritated and upset. It wasn't anything awful that happened. But I want to be able to go to a doctor's office where I feel more of a sense of safety. I actually have such a doctor but she isn't on the plan (my employer switched plans last July!). I sometimes go to this doctor but it is out of plan. I don't mind paying for the office visit, but then anything that flows from that visit is not covered in plan, and those things, like blood tests, etc., can add up very quickly. Not to mention that if I needed something more serious it would be prohibitive to pay out of pocket and only get partially reimbursed.
So, I understand why you feel so upset after your encounter with your doctors office.
I hope you feel better soon, Penny.
poster:noa
thread:336880
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/social/20040414/msgs/337134.html