I'm 31 years old and really have never had any sort of medical or health problems that necessitated me needing to see a doctor. Well, last saturday I woke up with a really bad pain in my upper back. By monday morning it hadn't gone away, and it was extremely painful, so I figured its time to finally put my overpriced medical coverage to use. If only I knew...
The office has hours of 9am - 4:30 pm. I had called on Monday initially right as they opened, stayed on hold a long time, asked to get an appointment. They told me they were booked that day but I should leave a message for a doctor and they'll get back to me with a recommendation. I thought they'd get back to me fairly soon so stayed at my desk most of the day waiting for a call. As the day progressed my back actually started feeling a little better so I wasn't really all that worried about them not calling. By the time I was ready to go home, they still hadn't called.
Tuesday morning I woke up and actually felt fine, not perfect, but no severe pain. Got to work and saw I had a message. They had called me back the day before at 4:35 (5 minutes after they officially close). I didn't bother calling back because I thought I was pretty much all better. Big mistake.
Wednesday I woke up and the pain was worse than ever. I thought about staying home but I decided to go to work. My problem was actually a little different this day. Before the pain was in my upper left back, right next to my spine. Today the pain was in the upper right back, closer to my shoulder. I figured I'd give it a day and see how it felt the next day.
Thursday morning I was hurting pretty bad still, so I called them up again at 9am. On hold for 15 minutes again. Told again there are no appointments so I should leave a message with a doctor and am transferred to an operator. I mention that I had called on Monday about the same problem but thought I was better so I hadn't called back. Said I still have the problem and its worse now. She says she'll take the info down and have a doctor review it. I asked her what the doctor said last time, since she did call back on Monday at closing. She brushes that off and says that since this is a separate incident she has to leave a new message and have it reviewed again. Ok, whatever, take the message...
Noon rolls around, still no call back. So I call them to see if a doctor has looked at the note yet. She says the doctor is busy with patients all day and probably won't be able to review it till the end of the day. I ask if I should just schedule an appointment then since it really hurts and I want to have it looked at. She puts me on hold and then comes back and says she needs to have the doctor review it first. I again ask what the doctor said on Monday but she doesn't answer. At this point I assume I'm going to get another call back at 4:30 after they are closed, at which point Thursday will probably be booked so I won't be able to get an appointment the next day either. If they had just put me down for an appointment to begin with I might be able to see someone the next day.
This time they had the decency to call around 3pm. They tell me they are short-staffed this week and the doctor suggested I just go see an orthopedic specialist instead. I didn't want to fully get into my symptoms in this message, but I'm fairly certain its not bone-related, which is what orthopedic is for. I'm guessing the doctor just saw the word "back pain", which usually is a spinal problem, even though its not even my spine that hurts, and brushes me off to someone else. I still ask if they might have any openings the next day to get checked out first there, but of course she says no, they are booked up tomorrow. Gee , thanks for nothing.
So I spend an hour try to find an orthopedic specialist that actually is in my medical plan. There are only 2 close to me. One is booked for the next 2 weeks. The other gave some fairly unintelligible story about how they are in the network, but only for consultations, if I needed xrays and stuff they can't provide them, which means they are useless. I finally find someone totally out of the way to go to that can take me on Monday, which means I have to miss at least half a day of work since its so out of the way. It also means it will be 9 days from the time I first had pain until I finally get to see someone, and I don't even think the person I'm going to see is even the right kind of doctor. But at least its someone.
Now, it might be partly my fault for not following up on the callback from Monday when I erroneously thought I was better. But the whole practice of needing a doctor to review a note before allowing me to schedule an appointment is just stupid, since it almost assures its an extra day delay to get an appointment since they'll inevitable get booked up while I'm waiting to hear back. Plus giving me a referral to another doctor without even personally talking to me is ridiculous. I never once even got to talk to a doctor, just gave an operator a brief description of my problem. They did tell me I could go to the emergency room if I needed to, but its not that bad, plus I have a major high deductable on emergency room visits.
So now I'm all mad and in pain still. Definitely time to pick a new primary care physician after this is done.
Cliffs notes:
- My back is killing me
- Doctor won't see me due to stupid office policies
- refers me to a specialist who I believe is the wrong kind of specialist without even hearing my problem
- specialists booked up for too long, have to make appointment 5 days in future at completely out of the way location
- have to endure 9 days of pain before anyone can even look at me
The office has hours of 9am - 4:30 pm. I had called on Monday initially right as they opened, stayed on hold a long time, asked to get an appointment. They told me they were booked that day but I should leave a message for a doctor and they'll get back to me with a recommendation. I thought they'd get back to me fairly soon so stayed at my desk most of the day waiting for a call. As the day progressed my back actually started feeling a little better so I wasn't really all that worried about them not calling. By the time I was ready to go home, they still hadn't called.
Tuesday morning I woke up and actually felt fine, not perfect, but no severe pain. Got to work and saw I had a message. They had called me back the day before at 4:35 (5 minutes after they officially close). I didn't bother calling back because I thought I was pretty much all better. Big mistake.
Wednesday I woke up and the pain was worse than ever. I thought about staying home but I decided to go to work. My problem was actually a little different this day. Before the pain was in my upper left back, right next to my spine. Today the pain was in the upper right back, closer to my shoulder. I figured I'd give it a day and see how it felt the next day.
Thursday morning I was hurting pretty bad still, so I called them up again at 9am. On hold for 15 minutes again. Told again there are no appointments so I should leave a message with a doctor and am transferred to an operator. I mention that I had called on Monday about the same problem but thought I was better so I hadn't called back. Said I still have the problem and its worse now. She says she'll take the info down and have a doctor review it. I asked her what the doctor said last time, since she did call back on Monday at closing. She brushes that off and says that since this is a separate incident she has to leave a new message and have it reviewed again. Ok, whatever, take the message...
Noon rolls around, still no call back. So I call them to see if a doctor has looked at the note yet. She says the doctor is busy with patients all day and probably won't be able to review it till the end of the day. I ask if I should just schedule an appointment then since it really hurts and I want to have it looked at. She puts me on hold and then comes back and says she needs to have the doctor review it first. I again ask what the doctor said on Monday but she doesn't answer. At this point I assume I'm going to get another call back at 4:30 after they are closed, at which point Thursday will probably be booked so I won't be able to get an appointment the next day either. If they had just put me down for an appointment to begin with I might be able to see someone the next day.
This time they had the decency to call around 3pm. They tell me they are short-staffed this week and the doctor suggested I just go see an orthopedic specialist instead. I didn't want to fully get into my symptoms in this message, but I'm fairly certain its not bone-related, which is what orthopedic is for. I'm guessing the doctor just saw the word "back pain", which usually is a spinal problem, even though its not even my spine that hurts, and brushes me off to someone else. I still ask if they might have any openings the next day to get checked out first there, but of course she says no, they are booked up tomorrow. Gee , thanks for nothing.
So I spend an hour try to find an orthopedic specialist that actually is in my medical plan. There are only 2 close to me. One is booked for the next 2 weeks. The other gave some fairly unintelligible story about how they are in the network, but only for consultations, if I needed xrays and stuff they can't provide them, which means they are useless. I finally find someone totally out of the way to go to that can take me on Monday, which means I have to miss at least half a day of work since its so out of the way. It also means it will be 9 days from the time I first had pain until I finally get to see someone, and I don't even think the person I'm going to see is even the right kind of doctor. But at least its someone.
Now, it might be partly my fault for not following up on the callback from Monday when I erroneously thought I was better. But the whole practice of needing a doctor to review a note before allowing me to schedule an appointment is just stupid, since it almost assures its an extra day delay to get an appointment since they'll inevitable get booked up while I'm waiting to hear back. Plus giving me a referral to another doctor without even personally talking to me is ridiculous. I never once even got to talk to a doctor, just gave an operator a brief description of my problem. They did tell me I could go to the emergency room if I needed to, but its not that bad, plus I have a major high deductable on emergency room visits.
So now I'm all mad and in pain still. Definitely time to pick a new primary care physician after this is done.
Cliffs notes:
- My back is killing me
- Doctor won't see me due to stupid office policies
- refers me to a specialist who I believe is the wrong kind of specialist without even hearing my problem
- specialists booked up for too long, have to make appointment 5 days in future at completely out of the way location
- have to endure 9 days of pain before anyone can even look at me