Time Wasted - RANT!

Yesterday was our first "closed Monday" for the store, so I scheduled a doctor appointment at 1 pm. My primary doc referred me to this doctor for some nerve testing because I've had a problem with my left hand since early August . I'm left handed, so it makes my life a little difficult - doing beadwork repairs for customers has been a real challenge. When I made the appointment, the scheduling person said that the testing itself would take up to 2 hours and I couldn't get an appointment earlier in the day because the doctor has limited slots on his schedule for this kind of testing. That didn't make me happy, as I like to have appointments early in the day so that even if the doctor is delayed a bit, it won't be a huge chunk out of the middle of my day. But, since we were closed on Monday, it wasn't too big of a deal

Got to the doc's office early - we'd skipped lunch so that I wouldn't be late. Being a new doctor for me, I knew that there would be paperwork to fill out and I didn't want to show up at 1 and then spend another 20 mins filling out papers - wasting even more time! When I signed in, the receptionist told me that the doctor was running "a little" late and that it would be about an hour AFTER my scheduled appointment time before I got in to see the doctor. That meant about a 90 minute wait, plus 90 mins - 2 hours for the testing. I said it would have been nice if they'd called to let me know. Even worse, there wasn't any place close enough to get lunch while I waited.

My first instinct was to just re-schedule and leave, but since I'd given Mike my cel phone and he'd already left to cruise around the area (he'd planned to drop in at a friend's store to visit them while he was waiting), I didn't want to make him turn right around and come back for me. So - I decided to fill out the papers and HOPE that the doc would not be as late as the receptionist had predicted.

Well, as in everything else lately, the HOPE thingy wasn't working this time, either. The waiting room was warm and stuffy, there was some insipid channel on the TV, I was hungry and the hormone therapy that I'm on for menopause isn't working, so I had almost non-stop hot flashes, not to mention my attitude getting worse after each flash. Mike came in at about 1:30 and asked what I was doing sitting there. He also was not happy with the wait. Finally, 2 o'clock came and still no sign of the doctor. Mike said he was going home. I told him to wait a minute and I would probably be going with him. I went to the window one last time and asked if there was any idea of when I'd see the doctor. Same answer - I don't know how much longer it will be. I said, just cancel the appointment - no, don't re-schedule, just cancel. I was aggravated and I used my slightly louder than inside voice and stomped out of the place complaining about how unprofessional they were.

I was almost to the car when the receptionist came out and said, "The doctor's ready now, you can come in." Oh, really? It was a complete coincidence that, as soon as I started making a fuss, the doctor magically was ready. Yeah, right - I was born at night, but it wasn't last night. I told the receptionist that I had cancelled the appointment, and I wasn't coming back - of course, since I was half way to the car, I couldn't use an "indoor voice". She got upset that I was "yelling" at her - it wasn't her fault. No, it wasn't her fault - it was the doctor's fault for acting so unprofessionally and putting her in that position.

I called my primary doctor this morning to get a referral to a different doctor. The receptionist said that the other doctor's office had called yesterday to complain about me.
She asked, "What happened?". I told her the whole story - including that I was loud and maybe a "little" obnoxious. She said, "I don't blame you. We'll make a note not to use this doctor when making referrals in the future."

The thing that bothered me most was that this was the second doctor in about a month that had done the same thing. I know it's a running joke about the time that people wait in a doctor's office, but I'm pretty well fed up with it.

The first time it happened, I had closed my store an hour early so that I'd be on time. Walked in exactly 1 minute before the appointment. The receptionist said, "The doctor is running late - about 50 minutes to an hour." I asked, "Why didn't you call me to let me know? I own a business and I wouldn't have had to close early, if you'd called me!" She said, "I'm sorry, but we don't do that." and gave some wishy-washy reason why. I grumbled about it being unprofessional and asked if I could re- schedule the appointment. I re-scheduled - which moved my appointment to October, 2 months later!

Note to Doctors' office staff - you have our phone numbers, PLEASE - if the doctor's going to be more than 15 minutes late, have the courtesy to CALL and let us know. If we are more than 10-15 minutes late, YOU cancel our appointments and often charge us for the missed appointment. Our time is no less valuable than yours is, even if we don't have an MD at the end of our name!