Dr 8(a) gave me an order for a blood test for standard counts when I saw him early January. He wanted to check the counts a little earlier, and of course the treatment lasted a little later (and was more spread out). I got the blood work done yesterday but no one called. I called this morning and one nurse couldn’t get in the system. They had the admin person call me back. The first this she told me was my counts were fine - and why shouldn’t they be, they were fine the day before treatment! Yikes. They weren’t fine at this point in the chemo cycle the last two cycles, in fact they were so bad they immediately started treatment with packed red blood cells once and immunity boosting shots - and wanted to (but waited too late) the other time. But not to worry the admin tells me she will ask the new temp Dr if I need another blood test this cycle or not. That gives me such confidence! NOT.
I wrote that 10 days ago. Yesterday I saw a new Dr (let's call him 8c) and was seriously disappointed that it took an hour until I got vitals taken, and was reseated in the main waiting room. Usually it's on to an exam room. So I went and talked to the admin person and she said there were still two ahead of me. So another hour wait? Seriously? I asked her if she ever called patients to tell them the Dr was behind and she said no. Yikes. She asked if I wanted to see a supervisor. Stupid question.
So the supervisor came over to talk to me and offered to jump me in line! How does that fix the issue? If the temporary Dr needs half hour appointments instead of twenty minute appointments they should increase appointment lengths, if he's staying until 7 to finish appointments that would stop patients from waiting for hours to see a Dr. Same amount of time, same number of appointments. She said she needed all the appointment slots. I said same number of appointments, less time waiting for the Dr for the patients. All she did was maintain party line. So they kept telling me "Miss Liz" would come talk to me. Whoever that is, she never did.
I liked Dr. 8c a lot. We talked about a lot of options and got the schedule down for the next month. I won't go to see another temp Dr without calling in first. DHR admin has never showed that they care one whit about patients. The Drs and nurses are awesome, but the admin sucks. Fix the problem. It's costing you Drs.
