So I went to the Doctor today.....

[90Xjay]

Ok you guys, have you ever went to see a new doctor and they have you fill out about 400 forms?
:lol:


I made an appointment to see a back clinic today, I have just had back pain on and off for a few years, no injury, I just want a plan to get feeling better. Last week they mailed me out a packet of forms that had to be filled out, my appointment was at 8:50 am, they told me to get there at 8:20 to fill out more forms.
These forms are insane.

You sign about 10 releases saying if your insurance does not pay, that they can and will do whatever to you. I understand that if they get stiffed they need recourse. Then about 3 forms was asking me if I was currently suing anyone about my back problem, you know, legal stuff.
None of that applied to me, but I still had to fill them out.

They want DL#, SS #, nearest relative not living with you. blah blah blah
So much personal info, scary.

SO I get flustrated with how people get treated (esp Me) and I make up my own form to get the doctor's office to fill out for me.

I ask them to be informed of every charge I would be ask to pay above my office visit co-pay, before the service was done.

I ask them what my average wait time would be each time I came in for a visit, and told them to include time spent waiting in the exam room.

I ask them if I would see the same doctor each time or just whoever was available

and I ask them how many forms would I need to fill out each time I came in and how frequently they would need to be updated.

When I gave the office girl my form to fill out, her mouth dropped wide open.

They took me into an exam room and before a doctor came in, the head office manager came in and said that they just could not fill out my form for me! They could not believe that a patient wanted to get some basic info from them about how I was going to be treated. They told me that they would have been glad to answer my questions verbally.

But the questions they ask me on the stack of forms had to be answered in writing by me.

I left and came home.

 

[judge09]

Well you can blame all that on the 1% of this population who sue at the drop of a hat. The medical community is in trouble. If I had the personally liability they had at my job I would make who ever sign their life away too.

 

[88Wrangles]

CJ Axles Aurora, Ohio are gone

haha, that is good!! That's one of the reason's I usually never go to a doctor or the hospital, unless it is extremely serious that I do.

Right now I'm sitting here with a broken toe, three broken fingers (up by the knuckle) and very bad back pain on top of that...No way I'm going to the doctor though

 

[stacker46]

You should have asked to record the conversation while the person verbally answered your questions... starting of course with them stating their entire name and position with the clinic. I wonder if they would have said no.

 

[90Xjay]

You should have asked to record the conversation while the person verbally answered your questions...

:lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

Never thought of that!

I felt like I was dealing with Lawyers, not doctors. Doing business there is like playing poker with Billy the Kid.

 

[TwistedCU]

Wasn't it Billy Carter who said we should shoot all the lawyers?

 

[mingez]

It sucks that you had to go through what you went through. It's the rampant amount of frivilous lawsuits that cause that kind of horse pucky. Why else do we have "Caution Hot" on every coffee lid these days? Because when someone is stupid enough to spill hot coffee on themselves they think that they are entitled to pass the buck on to all of the other consumers in the US. It's sad, and it frustrated you out of being treated.

Not really the same, but same difference I guess. Ahhhh....what to do?

 

[Snitty]

right there my friend is a Snitty move.... treat as you are treated... if they don't lube it for you, then you dip it in sand first

last year i had a painful case of the stones... i got myself to the emergency room... waited about an hour in an empty waiting room, then they called me over to ask questions... bla bla bla bla... then i asked a couple questions myself, couldn't get a straight answer from anyone... "ok, thanks for nothing, i'll be home grunting, you have my number if you want to call and help me"

 

[mud4feet]

My Jeep was stolen in central NJ Thursday night!

Wasn't it Billy Carter who said we should shoot all the lawyers?

Twisted quoting Billy Carter???? Now, THAT'S funny :lol: :lol: :lol:

 

[Tug-n-pull]

Sir my hat is off to you! That is one of the most impressive things I have heard in along time! Good Thinking. Tug

 

[TwistedCU]

You ought to send a copy of your form to the local paper with a description of your experience. I'd bet dollars to doughnuts that it would hit the paper. As frustrating of an experience as that must have been, that truly is a beautiful story.

 

[Special_K]

I left and came home.

Awesome. 8)

 

[southtj]

Wasn't it Billy Carter who said we should shoot all the lawyers?

Actually it was Shakespeare from Henry VI: "THE FIRST THING WE DO, LET'S KILL ALL THE LAWYERS."

 

[wm69]

now granted what I am going to say is my fault (my wife says I think everone's out to get me and I keep proving her right). We are pregnant again (due in late march) and go to the doctor back in the middle of september. He tells my wife she has a heart murmer (something we already knew) and she should get it checked out. Earlier this year the dentist refused to clean her teeth until she had the heart murmer checked out. We checked and it was going to run about $1K to have the tests run, so we opted to put that one off for awhile. Now the OBGYN is telling her to get it checked out so I say "this is medically necessary so insurance will cover it, right?" He says "sure". I say, "What about the deductible? The baby's not coming till next year so does this all go under one deductible?" The doc's reply is "yes, it's one medical condition so you only pay one deductible". Of course I take his word for it and of course he was wrong (stupid, stupid, why didn't I call the insurance company and check it out?). Turns out our deductible rolls over to the next year for stuff done after Oct 1st. The EKG was done sept 15th so I get to pay for it ($929.00 towards her 2004 deductible) and I'll get to pay another deductible (for 2005) in March. I knew better than to trust someone in that situation but I thought "he's probably right" and it cost me $1K. Least next time I'll know better. The thing that really pisses me off is the whole thing is over a heart murmer. They did the test and said "not going to cause any problems". If it had been the type of heart murmmer to possibly cause problems they would have simply given her a dose of antibiotic before she went into the delivery room. My question is this (and this all goes back to the doc's giving all thier cover-your-butt unneeded tests now). WHY COULDN'T WE HAVE JUST GIVEN MY WIFE A DOSE OF $10 ANTIBIOTICS INSTEAD OF ME PAYING FOR A $1K TEST? Docs now are so worried about people sueing that they make you take (and pay for) all these tests that to a rational person are totally unnessesary. Rant over, hope I don't have to sell a jeep to pay medical bills now. Best thing was the bill for the EKG was "due in full within 15 days". I put the thing on a credit card just to make the SOB's give 3% of thier profit on the test away.
As for insuarance, I'm starting to think I might be better off not having medical insurance and if something bad happens I can just declare bankruptcy with everyone else. I'm paying about 15% of my income in premiums and add a $1K deductible and $2K out of pocket max FOR EACH PERSON so I'm pretty much bankrupt anyway.

 

[redrooster]

Right on. Just wait til the baby is born then you will be out over $20 grand without the insurance.
I like how the doctors make you wait while they are out screwing around. My wife is a nurse in a GI office , so I get all the stories. They schedule you for a test at 7:00 then the doctor comes straggling in about 8:20 to perform the test. It's a total lack of respect for your patients. I would have said "customers" but a Doctor's customer is the insurance carrier and could give a damn about the patients without insurance.

 

[90Xjay]

The last baby we had, we looked into getting maternity insurance from my company. $300 per month, and had to be on it for a year before they would cover you


So, I took some cash out of my 401K and went to a local hospital and negotiated a cash deal. I could not believe the price I got. $994 for a normal delivery and overnight stay with no complications. If any had occured they would add accordingly.

AS for the OB/GYN, we found one on our town that would discount for cash upfront, $1500. The only thing else, was a AIDS test, (mandatory) and one other test, total about $200.
So on that deal with God's grace we got out way cheaper and it was an awesome feeling coming home from the hospital not oweing anyone a dime.

 

[wm69]

That's crazy. My wife's bill is going to be $3500 to the obgyn and our first kid cost $7500 more for the hospital part of it (so $11K total; insurance will cover all but $3K of the baby, but with my premiums this year I'm out $6500 this year). She had to have a Csection with the first and probably will for the second. Still makes me sick with all the insurance crap. Last year my premium increase was 3 times what my annual "cost of living" raise was. If that happens again I'm looking for a job with better benefits. I'm not taking what amounts to a pay cut every year.

 

[mud4feet]

OK, the old timer chimin' in. Just to show you how times have changed. When we had my son, I was working for the City of Cincinnati, paying $11/month for my family coverage health insurance (son was born in 1983). It cost me a total of $5 to have my son (I had to pay for the phone).....and he was 3 weeks premature - spent a couple of weeks in infant ICU. Won't begin to blame it on Bush - there's been quite a few administrations in between, all loaded with lawyers, all with the big ears toward the lobbyists. Don't know how you young folks manage, especially those with familys. My 2 bits,

mud

 

[TwistedCU]

WM69, what line of work are you in and in what area?

 

[wm69]

WM69, what line of work are you in and in what area?

I'm a bean counter (internal auditor) for a property management company. That's the official sounding way of putting it. The company I work for has 28 golf courses spread out from memphis to dallas to kansas city to oklahoma city and everywhere in between. I'm in charge of monitoring inventory for the proshops. The good part is I get milage (.375/mile on about 3K miles/month) and my old 93 accord is still going strong and it's depreciated all it's gonna depreciate (got it new as a teenager so I know it's mechanically ok but it doesn't look too nice). I also was the first person to have the job, so there's no right or wrong way to do it. I've gotten a pretty good system down and the profit margin has tripled in the last 3 years so I look good if I put out a resume. I like my job but I am underpaid (aren't we all?). Seriously, I'm making less than most of my friends I graduated with (University of AR business school) did when they started right out of school. Sure my jobs a whole lot cooler than theirs (I get caught up at the office I just get on the road and go check courses) but they get better pay and a whole lot better benefits. My company is family owned but has grown really fast over the last 10 years (we're building 4 new golf courses and manage about 25000 apt. units right now). We don't have 401K, the health insurance sucks, and no dental, optical etc. They give out pretty good xmas bonuses but you can't depend on that like you can a salary. As much as I like my job, I've got a wife and 1 1/2 kids, mortgage, car payment (wife's civic), and $28K in student loans and if I don't get a raise soon I'm gonna have to look elsewhere. I live in Fayetteville AR which is one of the fastest growing areas in the country thanks to WalMart's home office being nearby. Not like I counldn't find a higher paying job, but don't want to give up a job I like for one I hate. Nice delimma, huh? Do you keep the job you like and live paycheck to paycheck your whole life or do you go for the higher paying job you'll probably hate? :?: