Added November 6, 2011: Since sending a copy of this letter to the doctor, I spoke with his office manager and him, receiving both a good explanation and sincere apologies. I have returned to his office for my FAA medical exam and had a delightful experience with everything running on time and like clockwork.
Dear Dr. ___,
I had an appointment with you on Monday, October 17, 2011, and it was much less than a satisfactory experience. I left, appalled at how I had been treated. I hope that this letter will encourage other patients to stand up for their rights, to refuse to be treated like dirt.
Since it was the first time I had been to your office, I showed up at 9:40am for my 10:00am appointment. I recognize that it takes time to complete paperwork before an initial visit. I respect you need to maintain a schedule and used my time to help you out.
At 10:30am, a full 30 minutes after my appointment time, I was finally called from the waiting room. When I commented to the nurse about the half hour delay, she did not apologize. Instead, she told me that you had a lot of appointments for FAA medical exams that morning and only one EKG machine. Why did you make so many appointments for the same morning? Why was I affected, since my particular FAA exam does not include an EKG?
At 11:00am, a full hour after my appointment, I had still not seen you. I was still cooling my heels in one of your examining rooms. I got up and left.
Do you know what is most appalling? No one from your office bothered to call me to ask why I was not there when you finally got around to trying to see me. No one cared enough to find out why one of your patients, one of your cash-paying customers, had vanished.
Heads up, Doc! Including the time required to drive to your office and back, I gave you two hours out of the middle of my work-day. All of us patients who come to see you are people and deserve to be treated as such, with courtesy and respect.
— Art Zemon
HI. HOPE MY DOCTOR IS BETTER.
HAVE A NICE DAY.
BOB
Unfortunately, the nature of the business requires drs. to set appointments (would you rather be told to be there by 10am or morning-ish) but in dealing with people, it often requires more time than allotted. You can’t tell a patient, “well I heard something odd with your heart, but you’re already over your 15 minutes so you’ll have to make another appointment and hope you don’t have a heart attack between now and then.” Unfortunately, there’s also no incentive for drs to work faster (because there will always be other patients) and if a dr is good, people are willing to wait–trust me, I used to work in a dr’s office where a 3 hour wait was the norm and they would complain, but don’t think about suggesting they see another dr. While it is annoying to feel like you’re wasting your time, I would want a dr. that took that long with the other patients to take that long with me to make sure I was good and healthy before sending me back out there (or up there).
Kathy: My complaints do not include that this doctor ran behind schedule. I am upset because 1) it sounds like the schedule included more FAA medical exams than could be accomplished in one morning, 2) no one even bothered to apologize for the delay, and 3) no one cared enough to call me to learn why I had left the office without being seen.