How will I interact with my Doctor's Assistant?
Each doctor has his own assistant. This person will be seeing you through your entire experience with us for continuity of care. The assistant will see you in the office, answer your questions, precertify procedures with your insurance company, schedule your surgery, and provide you with any other information that you made need. The assistants do, however, follow the doctors to other clinics, and may often be assisting the Doctor with office procedures. They are not always at their desks to take your calls. If you need to speak with one of them, and they are out of the office, please leave a voice mail message and they will return your call as soon as they are able. If you require an urgent response, speak with the receptionist and she will get your message to the right person.
How do I prepare for an appointment?
We have appointments available at all of our offices, Monday through Friday. Whether it is in the morning or the afternoon depends on the schedule. Our schedule rotates to accommodate the surgeries and procedures. When calling for an appointment you may speak with whomever answers the phone. We would hate to have you wait for a return call from one of the assistants when any of us can help you with an appoinment. Please be prepared to provide us with your insurance card and photo ID, along with your primary doctors information.
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At your appoinment, you will be given two forms to fill out. Please be as thorough as possible, as they will help the Doctor to make the best decisions in regard to your surgical care.
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We do our best to schedule the office hours to run smoothly, however, some patients may have questions during their consultations or the doctor may have an emergency, causing us to get behind. There is also an element of unpredictability with surgical practices causing unavoidable delays.
What do I do if I need a medication refill?
If you require a refill on your medication, please call your pharmacy to request the refill and they will contact us.
What is the procedure for surgery or testing?
When you and the Doctor have determined a procedure is nescessary, there are many steps that must be followed. Some of these policies are dictated by the insurance companies.
1. Prior authorization of insurance. Nearly all insurance companies require notes and other documents before authorization, causing a delay in scheduling.
2. Scheduling your procedure. The actual schedule is based on the availability of both the Doctor and the facility. We wish that we had control over hospital schedules, but this is not the case. We will do the best we can to accomadate your scheduling needs.
3. Scheduling of anesthesia and assistants, if needed.
4. Scheduling of preoperative testing.
Once all of these steps are completed, we will then call you with your surgery schedule and other pre-surgery instructions.
What are my responsibilities as a patient?
In order to help you, please have the following information available for us:
All applicable test results, x-rays, or other information to help with your care.
Have your insurance referrals if your insurance company requires referrals for specialists. Contact your Primary Care Doctor prior to visits to assure that insurance referrals are done.
Know your insurance plan! Familiarize yourself with its policies and procedures.
We make our best effort to obtain these, but ultimately it is up to you.
What are the billing policies and procedures?
In order to to facilitate the insurance process, please help us with the following:
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Bring your referrals/authorizations with you to your visit. You are responsible for obtaining these, and they will only help to make your visit easier for you!
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Complete insurance information. We are more than happy to bill your insurance for you if you would please provide us with all of your insurance information including a copy of your card. We need the completion of the forms in order to help you.
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Self payment arrangements. We have a flexible billing plan for those patients without insurance. Arrangements must be made prior to elective surgery.
If you are a current patient, and have had a change of insurance or primary care physician, please notify us as soon as possible, so we may update our records. This will avoid confusion and delay in the scheduling procedure, as well as keeping costs to you down.
Our billing staff will be happy to answer your questions regarding any changes concerning services rendered by the physicians in our practice.
For any other facility, laboratory, anesthesiologist, or assistant services that were not provided by our practice, you will have to contact that facility or provider of service for questions regarding the bills for their service.