Doctor appointment - how long do you wait before cancelling?

[Hoop Thompson]

Had an appointment with the doctor yesterday at 9:15. Arrived at 9:10, but did not have to fill out any paperwork since I've been to this doctor in the past. After waiting for nearly 45 minutes and watching others get called ahead of me who arrived after me, I got up to cancel the appointment. As I was walking up to the receptionist's desk, the nurse came out and called me back to see the doctor.

So, my question is, how long do you feel it's appropriate to wait for a doctor's appointment before cancelling or walking out? I've never done that before and this was the longest I've ever had to wait to see the doctor.

 

[cornichon]

I don't know the answer, but I always get incredibly annoyed by stuff like that. How anyone can be 45 minutes behind by 9:15 is perplexing. Makes me think he/she didn't arrive to work on time.

 

[BarneyMiller]

Depends how bad I need to see the guy. If I'm bad sick and know I need some prescriptions to get over it quicker, I'll wait as long as it takes. If it is just a check up or something routine, I'd probably give them 30 minutes.

 

[anon_ph7vrsh7abnty]

And God forbid you are 10 minutes late because of your own meetings...

 

[Been Jammin]

I went to the doc for a physical last week. Was in the waiting room for prob 30 minutes. Appt was at 8:30 a.m. As I was sitting there, I saw a young lady come flying into the lobby and type her code in to get into the door that was, obviously, the employee entrance. I really only saw her back, and didn't think much of it.

After I was called, a few minutes later, the nurse asked me how I was doing. I told her that I was really hungry because I was fasting. She replied that she was empathetic because she woke up late and had to skip breakfast. That was when I put 2 and 2 together and realized that she was the one I saw arriving a few minutes earlier. Because she overslept, I had to wait an extra 30 minutes to be seen.

I am a nice guy, so I didn't say anything to her or the doc (who is a personal friend). It was inconvenient, but I found it to be a bit funny also.

 

[Been Jammin]

Originally posted by cornichon:

I don't know the answer, but I always get incredibly annoyed by stuff like that. How anyone can be 45 minutes behind by 9:15 is perplexing. Makes me think he/she didn't arrive to work on time.

Speaking as someone who is on the other side of the waiting room door....

You never know what might happen. Some days, appointments might go smoothly and the doctors/staff might be hanging out between. Other days, someone might call in sick (see above). A patient might come in for 1 thing then decide that he/she has 5 other issues that need to be addressed. I think it is probably a bit more unpredictable for veterinarians and pediatricians, but I'm sure crazy things happen for doctors who are just dealing with adults also.

 

[JonnyVito]

Originally posted by Been Jammin:

Originally posted by cornichon:


I don't know the answer, but I always get incredibly annoyed by stuff like that. How anyone can be 45 minutes behind by 9:15 is perplexing. Makes me think he/she didn't arrive to work on time.

Speaking as someone who is on the other side of the waiting room door....

You never know what might happen. Some days, appointments might go smoothly and the doctors/staff might be hanging out between. Other days, someone might call in sick (see above). A patient might come in for 1 thing then decide that he/she has 5 other issues that need to be addressed. I think it is probably a bit more unpredictable for veterinarians and pediatricians, but I'm sure crazy things happen for doctors who are just dealing with adults also.

Also with Docs and Vets you don't know what emergencies they are dealing with first thing in the morning. I would think this would put Vets behind more because most the time you don't take the pet to the ER just wait till the next day unless it is on the brink of death.

 

[Poketologist]

Personally we start rounds on the ICU on the sickest patients every day. We have to coordinate care between multiple different services (pulmonRy, cardiology, nephrology, transplant, etc). Sometimes takes a while to get things sorted out in these very sick individuals. That's one of many possible reasons your doc may be delayed.

Ahh, who am I kidding, I had a 7 am tee time and had a couple,extra beers after the 9th hole.

 

[shortbus]

I have never had to wait more than 10 minutes at my current GP but maybe once in nearly 10 years.

When I lived in Enid I would have to wait 30 minutes every time. Then the doc would spend 30 minutes BSing with me after my appt.

I prefer the all business in and out approach. Bedside manner isn't nearly as good as the old guy but I don't need s buddy. I need a dr!
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[BigBobBarker]

My clinic never gets behind but procedure days is another story. Mostly do to the staff moving like molasses after lunch or waiting on anesthesia. Lol!

 

[pcaggie]

Shortbus, did you have Dr. Janzen?

 

[shortbus]

No. Robi Chatterji. Super nice guy!
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[BvillePoker]

I hardly ever have to wait when I actually get an appointment with my GP. I had a pretty serious illness not too long ago and called my GP's office and was told it would by 7 days before I can see him. When I did finally get to see him we had a conversation that having to wait 7 days did not meet my expectation as a customer of his service. He understood and said he would take steps to correct it and make sure that it was noted on my file that the receptionist needed to make every effort to make an appointment for me that day or the next. Of course I have seen this GP for 20+ years. My family was one of his first customers when he started his practice and we have a very good relationship. I know I am a hard ass and have high expectations for customer service in any service that I pay for. I feel that a doctor is not different than any other service industry in that I am a customer that can choose to take my business elsewhere if I am not getting the type or level of service I expect. I also negiate fees and rates with my Dr and Dentist for some services. I don't think I am the typical doctor's office customer though.

 

[SamuraiFred]

I run a pretty tight ship and only get behind if something wacky comes in (it happens). That being said, in my experience, the majority of doctors that run behind do so for 2 reasons....

1) they are habitually late to the office
2) they spend lots of extra time bullshitting with then patients about stuff not related to their appointment

 

[CranioCowboy]

I also run on time. I hate when I wait for a drs appointment so I don't do it to my patients. The 3rd reason drs run late is that they are screwing around on the internet. Have a couple friends that will make a patient wait 15-20 minutes until they are finished surfing.

At the same time, my ENT I refer to always runs 30-45 minutes late, sometimes over an hour and a half. I tell my patients it's worth the wait, there's no other ENT I will work with, and I wouldn't refer anywhere else. I then tell them to bring a book...

 

[TheRedSon]

I waited four hours once to see a pediatric neurosurgeon. I would wait a month to see this guy again though. I never had to wait to see the pediatric GI, but after 3 appointments with him there was no way in the world he was ever putting his hands on my daughter again and we switched providers altogether. Maybe I don't need the world's best bedside manner, but my 5 year old certainly does.

I generally don't have more than a 10-15 minute wait to see my GP in the lobby, but I have waited much longer in the room after they've called me back before. I don't usually mind. He is excellent at his job because he's the only GP I've ever had that is consistently listening to what his patients are saying. Most GP's I've been to act like there's something else they'd rather be doing or like I shouldn't take more than 15 minutes to service.

 

[AnniePokely]

When I would take my mom to see her cardiac surgeon (John Randolph) at Oklahoma Heart Hospital, our minimum wait was 2-3 hours. On more than one occasion it was over that. Every. Single. Appt. That was standard for every patient seeing him. If you've seen him before, you went through it as well.
It was SUPER annoying, but we knew he was top notch, and he treated my mom very good. He only saw patients on certain days in his office in okc.

We finally figured out that you sign in and leave and go to the mall. Come back in 2.5 hours.

 

[Johnny_Knoxville]

1st World Problems.....

Just got back from a medical mission trip to Uganda in December. Patients waited overnight to see a doctor. There were over 100 standing in line every morning.

And they were delighted to be there.

 

[Orange_PhD]

Fred

3.),Overbooking

 

[Rulz]

"Waiting on anesthesia".....LOL

In my years of passing gas, if a surgeon had a late start time, it was never once related to "anesthesia" lol. It's almost always preop not getting their crap together until the last minute and not getting the patient ready on time, the patient was late.....or the surgeon came in 5 minutes before his scheduled cut time to see the patient and couldn't understand why we didn't have the patient in the OR, tubed, draped, and prepped for surgery....which, for the general public, is never going to happen since we can't take the patient back to the OR until after the surgeon has entered the building and has verified the patient and the operative site and whatnot.

Most anesthesiologists and CRNAS have their side of the drape prepped and ready prior to their next case. Not so much for time, but for safety reasons really. Bad form to be diving into a drawer looking for something when all hell breaks loose. Once the patient is on the table, it doesn't take but about 3 min to have the patient asleep and the drape to be placed. Before and beyond that time....it was always out of our hands as to the cause of delays....

But on the other side of that...there are some anesthesiologists who were slow as hell as well. Then you get into the little wars that go on between surgeons and anesthesiologists...which can be almost comical. Ahhhh....I don't think I would go back to all that for any amount of money. Hours and Days of petty fights about the most trivial bs.

 

[BigBobBarker]

Rulz,
I am an anesthesiologist doing pain. It was a bit of a joke but still the truth. It is just a situation where the anesthesiologists are at another hospital and are late coming over to the ASC for afternoon implants. I know they are working and it is out of their control.

 

[Rulz]

Oh I know lol. Wasn't getting the red ass about it.

It was always more or less funny to me how everyone always got their panties in a wad about time during my days in the OR. It never seemed to me that anyone was all that late, and if they were, there was probably a damn good reason they were. Everyone (at least from my experience) just wanted to do their job right and get things done on time, it was silly to point fingers in the first place. The things that usually held up surgeries the most were usually a result of the patients either coming in late or an emergency would pop up. In my case, we had to cover OB as well....which was difficult since we were so short handed.

What used to really get to me were the Ortho guys. They would call for a block to be placed, then bitch because it wasn't done on time. Juggling finishing the paperwork and trying to stick a needle into someones nerve sheath and then make sure that you got them asleep before a cut time was nearly impossible when you had a full day, and also when you are running between floors throwing in epidurals and doing preop. The "5 minutes" between cases that were allotted was laughable. I'm not going to say where this all took place....but I am pretty sure they changed everything there now.

Doing pain huh? Good for you. Always thought about going into that. I've been out of the game for 8 years now. Doubt I will ever go back. But if I did, it would definitely be to do that.

 

[BigBobBarker]

Pain is a lot of fun. Definitely a different practice than doing OR anesthesia. There was a DO pain fellowship in Tulsa for a year or two. An older guy who used to be one of the OSU FM attendings, then did gas at OSU, was their first fellow and went to work for the group that sponsored it. You would know him. Larry McKenzie or something like that? I would really think about hitting those guys up, and doing an unaccredited fellowship for a couple years and getting back into clinical practice while you still can. You could set up in Claremore and do very well and have a great lifestyle.
As you know, with pain you set your own schedule and there aren't emergencies...