This has been a trope forever, but is it really still common? I usually get into a room within a few minutes of my appointment time. Then a tech takes my vitals and collects other info - which is part of the appointment and the doctor doesn’t need to be there for it. Then a few minutes later the actual doctor shows up. I haven’t timed it but it’s not annoyingly long.
edit: American here
Primary care? No. I generally get in on time.
Specialists? JFC I waited an hour and a half one time for a literal BY LITERAL I MEAN LITERAL 2 minute appointment. I almost fucking left at the 1 hour mark but that’s when they started telling me I was next. This place charges $50 for missed appointments without 48 hour notice too. And 10 minutes after your appointment time is considered missed if YOU’RE the one who is late.
Which all makes sense until they leave you in the waiting room for an hour and a half and you’re left wondering if you can charge THEM for your damn time.
Specialists are a whole different ballgame. When my daughter got treated for a tumor (she got cured) we learned that “waiting” is cancer’s middle name.
It depends on the doctor today. I have a few that make you wait forever and then are in and out in 30 seconds when they see me.
Well yeah in civilized countries it is the norm. You know, countries where you don’t have to go into debt for multiple generations just cos u visisted the doctor once. That explains why in the US you don’t have to wait - there simply aren’t a lot of people who can afford to see a doctor.
My fav was a doc office that gave arrival times, not appointment times. When pressed, the appointment time was 30 minutes after the arrival time.
I bring this up every time (and I recognize it’s a joke in this context) but I need to emphasize it’s administrations fault, not the doctor, usually. They force 15 minute appointments and a full schedule, which is simply not enough if anything complex takes more time. And that delay grows and grows throughout the day. You will get the worst delay right before lunch or right before the office closes, because you get to feel the extent of every delay combined
Yes very true. But at the same time you have two scenarios. 1, the doctors hired the administrators. 2, the doctors sold their clinic to a company that buys up clinics and sets up administrators that do this. Now becuase many doctor owned clinics have sold out for a big payday, new doctors have much less choice in where they work. They usually can’t afford to open a private practice, so they have to start out working at clinics owned by corporations. The lesson? Look for a private practice doctor any time you can. (In the US at least)
Okay so let’s drag these administrators into the street and give em a piece of our minds. Just another capitalist pig
Note that the reduced delay after lunch happens if (as is usual) the doctor skips lunch. Medicine seems like a miserable profession for most specialties.
Yes :)
I was just bitching about this last month.
If you don’t get in the little room half-an-hour after you get there, then it takes even longer.
Doctor’s offices are the DMV of today.
