So…we have Kaiser Permenente for our health insurance provider and I decide that I should have a physical before having the boys “changed” to a purely decorative status. I go to kp.org, their website, to find out how one obtains services of their crack medical team and to find out how one gets referrals to urologists. As I suspected one does have to have referrals so going to get the physical first seems like an even smarter idea than it did before.
First I set up my account using their on-line function and that seems to go pretty well. I can have it call me Mig, David, audry whatever and it doesn’t, seem to get confused (nice little touch there), and then I figure I’ll fill in stuff.
It has a function to list allergies and I go to it and it correctly informs me that the system has no allergy information on me. That sounded reasonable. I search for the button that lets me list my allergies….um…can’t find it. I can clearly see the button that allows me to download a form, fill it in, and then mail it to them…but no on-line function. Well to heck with that! They’re gonna ask me for that when I show up and get handed that little clipboard so why spend the time now?
I decide to checkout and assign myself a primary care physician. So I click on the select a primary care physician link. Aha…FIRST you have to select your plan, they have a lot so there’s a completely counterintuitive search function to select plans. I choose the option to search by name of plan. I enter it in…and it takes me down the page to where ALL the plans are already listed…just off the screen so you can’t see that they’re there. Nice. So, I click on our plan, and next it has a radio button for selecting either A) the KP doctors assigned to KP facilities, or ….nope only one radio button, they list that there are other available doctors through our plan but you gotta call an 800 number to find that. Nice. I check the KP radio button BUT it’s not a radio button, it takes right off and brings me a form to search through. The form says it’s a provider search form. The first box says enter last name or name of facility. Really? OK…since I’m searching for doctors…I enter in the name of the facility near me and hit enter. Up pops a list of one, which, not too surprisingly has the name I entered. OK, that was stupid but I bet if I click on that facility, I’ll get the list of providers there! Nope, I get its address and the option to display it on a map. OK, I’m here, I’ll bite. Show it to me on a map! Nope, first I have to tell it where I’m starting from…full address…THEN it shows me it on a lame map (Not google or yahoo, or mapquest map) OK, backing up to that lovely provider search form…I leave the doctor names empty since after all, that is what I’m searching for!!! I enter in internal medicine, male, accepting new patients (Note: some might say that if I’m choosing a primary care physician that showing me doctors who are NOT accepting new patients would not be as helpful as it might otherwise seem, but I’m now a little leery of this website and I’m trying to limit by disappointments at this point). And voila! I get every freakin doctor in the mid-Atlantic area. Nice…It’s fortunate though since there are only two male doctors accepting new patients in the
See, although I started this path by selecting the choose a primary care physician, when I get down to looking at Dr. McClain there are zero options to say YES, that’s the dude for me! Nothing…So…what the heck? What do I do next? There are links to validate his board certifications which will take you to the AMA website, etc. I think that’s not what I am trying to do. There’s a link to the facility but I’m not falling for that again…I fail…
OK, so I work my way back up and decide that maybe I can get through to Dr. McClain via the appointment scheduler. Silly me. Surprisingly I get to log in again. Hadn’t done that in a while so it was refreshing to do something that appeared to work. I get to pick my plan again, not sure why since it has now acknowledged that it knows who I am but again, now that I know the plans are sneaking around under there, it’s not too terrible. It let me pick a medical center. Then it shows me a form with my options for scheduling with them, there are several for old ailments, new ailments, etc. and one for physical! I pick that. It has date range options. Below that are check boxes where you can enter in AM or PM preferences for each day of the week (10 in all! For those of you watching at home). It is completely unclear what happens if you pick something less than a week up top that doesn’t correspond with a Monday-Friday timeframe and I choose not to explore that. It then shows me a Dr. Akberry in what I would have guessed was a drop down list but no, it’s highlighted like I can change it but guess what…I can’t. It has options to search for doctors! OK, yay! That’s what I wanted an appointment for a physical with Dr. McClain! I am almost there! No…it takes me back to the Pick a Plan function at the top of the search function…I almost weep but stay strong and just make whimpering noises. That’s OK cuz I’m at home by myself and no one will hear.
I have been defeated by the website…so much for e-medicine Take 1.
So I go old school and pick up the phone and dial the 800 number. For reasons I can’t understand I am disinclined to try their automated telephony system and remain mute until a representative comes on the line, we’ll call her Jill for no particular reason. Jill is having a bad day. She asks me how she can help me today, and I tell her that I’d like to set up an appointment. I tell her I tried to use the on-line system but that it only resulted in raising my blood pressure. (a little medical humor). She asks me if I am experiencing high blood pressure now. I tell her no, that was just a joke. She is amused…not. She asks me for my medical record number, my name, birth date, address, phone number (I get to give this to her four (4) times since she gets lost after three crows fly into a bush and phone numbers have at least 10 digits). She asks for another phone number which I hesitated to give her given her crow-counting handicap but go ahead and three times later we get my cell phone number in there. Then she asks me why I want to see a doctor for. I tell her a physical. She says…”I see your primary physician is Dr. Akberry, that’s who you need to see for this.” I say, “I’d like to change to Dr. McClain.” She says “Oh, I can’t do that. Let me transfer you to someone who can.” Defeated…thought we were there….no…I listen to music on hold…
“Hello” says Latoya! “Hello” I say, “I’d like to change my primary care physician can you help me with that?” “Sure” she says. Latoya is having a much better day than Jill. We then get to do the crow-counting dance of the Medical Record Number and review my name, date of birth, addresses and phones. I ask if we could please change to Dr. McClain. She says “Sure, one moment while I pull that up.” I listen to music on hold. I listen to more music on hold. A little more yet....Latoya comes back to me (I thought we were getting along so well and then there was that long pause…she said she’d be right back….) anyway, Latoya tells me that she can not change my primary care physician because of the particular plan that we have but if I stay on the line she can transfer me to someone who can. You guessed it, more music on hold…..
Jeff answers the phone. Jeff too likes to play so we do the Crow counting games which at this point I’m really good at. I win handily. Jeff then accesses my record and informs me that my primary care physician is Dr. Akberry. “Yes, I’d like to change that to Dr. McClain if I may” I reply. Jeff is not a talker. There is silence on the line for about 30 seconds. “Hello?” I say. “Oh, I’m still here” says Jeff. “One Sec…” It is more than one, but I think that’s just a figure of speech, so I take no offense. More silence on the line…I start to miss the Music. Jeff comes back and informs me that he has indeed switched my primary care physician to Dr. McClain. A VICTORY!!!! Jeff asks if there’s anything else he can do for me today? “I don’t suppose you could help me schedule an appointment with Dr. McClain can you?” Jeff almost laughs, I can hear the smile in his voice as he lets me down gently. BUT he transfers me to someone who can….
Ann answers the phone and I’m now almost a fully-trained KP employee so I’m totally ready. YES! I am so good. We do the crow counting game! Ann is sharper than most so it’s not as much fun. So, now that Ann is fully acquainted with my particulars and has verified that Dr. McClain is my new and bestest primary care physician ever AND now knows that I want to have a physical, she is all set to sign me up! But wait...It appears that Dr. McClain does not have appointments for physicals remaining in his on-line schedule for the month of June. Oh, um…OK”, I say “How early in July can we do?” Ann is far too sharp for that one. “Well you see the doctors have to give us their schedules each month and since it’s only the 4th today, we won’t have it until Monday the 8th” There is a long pause that Ann is perfectly comfortable with. I break the palpable tension by saying “So…I should call back Monday?” Ann is a sharpy….”Yes” “Ok, thank you Ann” I hang up.
I fear my brain exploded but I am not brave enough to try to schedule an emergency appointment. Instead I sit here wondering just how bad would state-run medicine have to be to lose to this? Really?
No comments:
Post a Comment