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Healthcare

Our Policies

Appointments

Patients are seen by appointment. Physician may have a slightly different schedule for appointments during these hours. While we do try to accommodate “walk-ins” without an appointment, we cannot guarantee that a doctor will be available to see you or how long you will have to wait to be seen. If you have a medical need and your schedule makes committing to a time difficult, let us know your situation, and we will do our best to accommodate you.

Generally, the last appointment of the day will be at 3:00 PM. This allows us the time for us to care for all patients in the office, report test results to patients, and return messages left for us that day.

We expect there will be times that you need to be seen urgently. Therefore, we reserve certain appointment times to accommodate these situations. It is our policy that anyone who needs to be seen urgently can and will be seen by one of the doctors within one business day, and usually the same day. In the unlikely event we are unable to do so, we will do our best to help direct your care.

Appointment scheduling is based upon appointment type. Performing a physical exam or “check-up” requires more time than treating a sinus infection. We reserve specific appointments for more extensive or comprehensive appointments. Addressing multiple problems in one office visit may require a follow-up visit to have enough time and information to complete the evaluation. Please be as clear as possible as to the nature of your appointment, so that we may schedule your visit appropriately.

We understand that your time is valuable. Our goal for scheduling is to try to balance our availability to all patients with adequate time to listen, examine, test, diagnose, prescribe, and discuss all issues you have. It is not our policy to overbook our schedules.

To help us stay on schedule:

  • Keep your personal and insurance information up-to-date before coming to your appointment by submitting it by fax using downloadable forms.
  • Bring your insurance card(s) (your secondary insurance card too), and check that all of your information is current and correct.
  • (If required by your insurance plan) Select a physician in our practice to be your primary care physician before coming to your appointment.
  • Come in at least 15 minutes early to your appointment if you are either a new patient, have not been in the office in over a year, or have ANY changes to your insurance benefits. Otherwise, arrive a few minutes earlier than your scheduled appointment time.

Cancellation Policy

Since we do have limits to how many patients we can see each day, it is important that you notify us at least 24 hours in advance of your appointment should you need to cancel or reschedule. This includes scheduling a same-day appointment and later canceling it.

When one doesn’t show up for his/her appointment or cancels with little advanced notice, it takes away our opportunity to provide another patient attention for a medical need.

Any patient who fails to show up for an appointment, or fails to give at least 24-hour advanced notice of cancellation, will be subject to a fee of $25 - $75 (depending on the type of appointment). If you have an appointment on a Monday and need to cancel or reschedule, please call the office on Friday. Our answering service does not take messages for the office after hours.

After-Hours

We have a physician on-call for emergencies 24 hours a day, every day of the year. The doctor may be reached by calling our answering service using our office phone number. The on-call physician is available if you are having a medical problem and need advice as to what to do. The physician is not on call to treat medical problems or to refill prescriptions. You will need to call during office hours if you need treatment or medication refills.

We do share call with other internal medicine physicians, so do not be concerned if a physician who is not in our practice returns your call.

As a rule, we do not call in any controlled substances after hours. Please do not ask the on-call doctor to make an exception.

Our answering service does not take messages for the office nor give medical advice. Please call the office during business hours for any routine or non-emergency matters.

Prescription Refills

Always contact us at least one week before you will run out. This gives us time to check to see whether you are due for any follow-up visit or testing.

If you are an existing patient and have not been seen within the last year, an appointment may be required prior to refill.

Some medications require periodic testing to determine their effectiveness and safety before refills will be prescribed.

Never run out of your medication. Being off your medication, even for one day, may lead to medical problems or incorrect test results. If you can not get in to see us before you will run out, we will try to call in enough medication to hold you over until you can get in.

We make every effort to accommodate your prescription refill request by the next business day.

Payments and Billing

Copayments, Coinsurances, and Deductibles

If your insurance plan requires you to pay a copay, this must be done at the time of your office visit. Additionally, you may have coinsurance and/or deductible amounts required by your insurance carrier. Any outstanding balance on your account – after adjusting for all of your insurance’s responsibilities – is also due at the time of service.

Failure to pay your known copay or any other payments owed at the time of your visit is subject to an additional late fee of $25.

Claims Submission

We will file claims to all insurance companies with whom we have contracts (“in-network”). Whenever possible, we will file your claim to your secondary insurance carrier as well.

Non-Covered and Out-of-Network Services

Medical services that are considered by your insurance company to be either not covered or not medically necessary will be your responsibility to pay at the time of service.

If services that we take part in providing (e.g. lab tests) are to be billed to your insurance company by a third-party provider (e.g. the lab), we will use your “in-network” provider unless you specify otherwise. If you provide incorrect or incomplete insurance information at the time of service, resulting in us using a provider who is “out of network”, you will responsible for any related claims according to the terms of your insurance plan for “out-of-network” services.

Medicare Billing

Our practice has always been open to new and existing Medicare patients, and we will continue this policy. We accept Medicare assignment.

Medical Records Requests

We require written authorization to release your medical records to someone other than yourself. Print and send us a request with our online form. Our office will contact you to answer any questions and inform you of any processing fee required to complete your request.

If you wish someone else to send their medical records to us, we have a form you may complete and print out to send to them.