A Doctors office is NOT an insurance agent

If you are looking for new insurance...

DO NOT CALL YOUR DOCTORS OFFICE UNTIL YOU HAVE ALL OF YOUR NEW INSURANCE INFORMATION WITH YOU!

They can NOT tell you what plan to choose or which company to go with. 

Please do not yell or harass them when they tell you this. 

If you are a current patient and switching insurances then you would have to let them know to make sure they participate with your new plan. If you don't and show up to an appointment with no information, no referral, no insurance or have a plan they don't participate with.

You will either have to cancel, re-schedual or pay for it out of pocket. 

Please be consideret and understanding. 

"Did you call me?"

"Did you call me?"

"I just spoke with you!"

"Someone just called me from there."

"Do you know who just called me?"

"Do you know why they called me?"

"Do you know what the voice mail is about that they left me?"

Theses are just a few questions that receptionists and phone operators hear. 

Interestingly enugh, people still think that companies have seperet phone numbers for every employee. Or that there is some system that will keep track of all out going calls. Or that a person can be forced to talk to them...

I can not understand this. I have not found anyone that can understand this. Or explain it. 

Please, if you recived a voicemail, missed a call or are just calling a company back... Know the name of who you are calling back. If you missed a call wait to see if they left a voicemail And listen to it to see if you even have to call back. 

This will make getting your call to the right person much easer. 

Cancel vs Reschedual

Please remember that when you call to  reschedule your appointment to another day or time say "reschedule". 

Pleas remember that when you call to cancel your appointment because you no longer feel that you want it say "cancel".

Do not say you want to cancel your appointment and then get angry because you really wanted to reschedule. This is two separate process that take time to correct. Please understand this if you make this mistake.

That Holiday Feeling

So it's the holidays and that means people are traveling... and realizing that may0ey they should have going in for a follow up appointment when they were told.

Please, please, please don't try and force your doctor to 'squeeze you in for a quick check up'. This is the most common thing I have heard and it usually comes right after said person just explained how they decided not to show up (or call us) to their last appointment but now that their trip/Holiday is here they NEED TO BE SEEN NOW!

Doctors offices are being forced to tighten up on policies because patients don't call to cancel appointments or because they beg, plead and lie to get seen. I was literally told by a patient that they were fine but just wanted to talk to the doctor.

But! On the flip side, I have had patients call in and cancel their appointment because of how crazy the holiday is. One was a post-op and we were like, no you have to come in because you just had your hip/knee/shoulder replaced and the big metal staples need to come out and then you get a lolly pop.

Please be considerate of your doctors during the holidays and plan ahead.

Asking for a job at your doctors office

Don't do it.

If you do and are told that they are not hiring for the love of god do
not keep asking and insisting that they need to call you because you
really need this for convenience reasons. In fact this will only make
you look worse.

Seriously, this is not a way to endear yourself to a potential employer.

First, the people at the check out counters have and want nothing to
do with hiring. They are busy checking people out and if you are
holding up the line this makes everyone upset at them.

Second, trying to grab your doctor or their secretary and insist upon
them that they should hire you for the location and position that you
want is a really fast way to piss everyone off. That is extremely
inconsiderate to the secretaries, the doctors and their patients.

Most doctors offices will hire through a hiring agency. This is
because they do not have the time to interview people because they are
busy treating patients. Walking into a doctors office and asking for
the hiring manager when you have no idea if they are hiring or not is
a great way to get your resume tossed with out a second thought. No
one is going to be interested in hiring someone that inconsiderate.

I know this seems harsh, but seriously if you do this I have little
sympathy. If you do this after commenting on how busy we are then I
have no sympathy for you at all.

Cross posted at:
http://www.LifeAfter28.com
http://learnedwhileworking.blogspot.com

What your Doctor means by emergancy

This topic comes up not because of anything good, but because there
are people out there that take advantage of a system.

The system in question is the one set up for people that go to the
emergency room. Back in the day when this system was developed (and
every office has some type of system) everyone involved with making it
probably assumed that only real emergencies would happen.

In this day and age some people will go to the emergency room just so
they can force their doctor to see them sooner. For this type of
person it is generally for something small that they have been having
treated by their doctor already that is not an emergency.

Here is a fictional example of what I am talking about.

A person that did not set an appointment before a vacation they had
planned six months ago and now 2 days before their trip want to be
seen. They call in and insist that it is an emergency because their
knee always bothers them and now they really need to be seen before
their trip. When they find out that there is not availability before
their trip they start yelling at the person on the phone. They are
then advised that if they feel they truly need to go to an emergency
room then they should make that decision. The person then huffs about
this 'poor treatment' to their friends and some how finds out that if
they go to an emergency room then the doctor will be forced to see
them ASAP. With this in mind they go to the ER make a scene and then
call up their doctor saying that now they have to be seen before their
trip.

This fictional person has now taken a slot that could have been used
for someone with a broken bone or sever burns or anything else that
qualifies as an emergency. They have not only been inconsiderate to
other people but to their doctor and to the emergency room. They have
also spent an obscene amount of money.

This is not and never will be appropriate behavior.

I have been asked by patients wanting to know if they go to the ER if
they will be seen today when their appointment is the next day. For
that instance I said no.

First of all, by the time they would have finished dealing with the ER
then they would still have to be seen the next day because who has
ever heard of a fast trip to the ER?

Secondly all ER visits (at my office) are not scheduled by the
reception area but by the secretaries themselves. This is because they
schedule things by priority. Immediately life threatening, Urgent, but
not immediately life threatening or Less urgent. This is the same
method used in the Emergency Room which is why the wait can be so
long.

I just can't understand how some people can think that abusing this
system is a good thing. These same people with have fits about long
wait times that they have caused or added too. I just... I just don't
get it.

Cute joke

On a humerus note: listing 'work' as an allergy at your doctors office. This was cute and gave us a good laugh when we found it this morning.