Personally, I’d much rather my doctors have an hour break than not. It’s humane and it gives me a much better chance of having a doctor who still has a fresh mind if I’m the 4 o’clock patient.
I have a soft spot for my OB/GYN because he always took the time to thoroughly answer my questions and concerns during my pregnancies. He still does, although the pregnancy days are long past.
He also squeezed me in several times when something just didn’t seem right, including the day we found out the baby I was carrying would not survive. He was kind and gentle and acted with us as though he had all the time we needed with him. (I could hear the chaos at the reception desk, so I knew it wasn’t really true.)
So, when I have to wait at his office, I really try to be understanding. I believe he is trying his best to meet each patient’s needs (and pregnant women have lots of needs.)
I get that the staffers are mandated to have breaks, but nothing says they all have to happen at the same time, thus effectively shutting the office down. So this one has a break from 11:30 - 12, that one 12 - 12:30, that one 12:30 - 1, thus still providing uninterrupted service for patients walking in.
I respectfully disagree that staff meetings and partner-practice meetings should occur in the middle of the day. They should occur before or after office hours. I also think reading journals for the professional is an off-hours activity. But again, I’m biased given the fact that I kind of live with the Energizer Bunny of Ob-Gyns, ha ha. I’ll have to get a typical schedule from him, but a typical day might be: Surgery at 7:30 am, Office from 10 am - 7 pm, charting and paperwork 7 - 7:30 pm, return calls to patients 7:30 - 8 pm, prescription filling (can be done at home via iPad) from 8 - 8:30 pm, then professional journal reading til bedtime. Obviously a delivery or emergency throws that off kilter, but that’s the general gist.
Office hours can range from 7am - 7 or 8 pm - mid day is the most likely time to have most staff available.
In addition, depending on the number of physicians, you need to have more than one person available to assist - a front of the house person, an MA (at least) to do vitals, take history, settle in exam room.
Also if it’s a teaching environment (associated with a medical school or a private practice that takes med students or residents) mid day time is often spent teaching/precepting.
Anyway, these might be questions to ask when choosing a provider. How many providers on staff? Do you close for the lunch hour? Do you have evening hours? What is your average wait? (stats are actually often kept for things like this - they may not share - especially if there waits are long - but if they are short, they may be proud of that and want to share!)
My physician’s office that has a sign “If you have been waiting for 15 minutes let us know”. It is a beg practice and I have never waited more than the promised 15 minutes max. I have walked in and been told I have to reschedule because of a baby delivery.
My kids used to go to a pediatric group where we routinely had to wait an hour or more after having been placed in an examining room.
I understand that it’s hard to predict the number of sick kids per day, so long waits happen. But what drove me nuts is that the doors to the examining rooms opened inward, and the doctors and nurses would open the door without warning. So I would have to spend an hour constantly pulling a toddler (or often, two children if I had to bring both with me to one kid’s appointment) away from the door so that the child wouldn’t get hurt when the doctor finally entered. And the staff wouldn’t allow parents/patients to keep the examining room doors open.
I’ve noticed that nowadays doctors and nurses knock before entering an examining room. I suspect that a health professional injured someone once by opening a door and smacking it into the patient and that the insurance companies now require the warning knock. Good idea.
CGH - so sorry about the baby even if it was a long time ago.
My wait at my GP doctor averages 1.5 hours. About an hour in the reception area followed by another half hour in the exam room. The reason is that he spends as much time with each patient as is required. I never complain because he does the same for me. I just know I will be there for quite awhile. I tried scheduling right after lunch and when I got there they were still at lunch because they were running late. I don’t think the doctor actually got a break, just the staff. Then I tried a few times scheduling just before lunch and that was always late too. I tried getting the first appointment in the morning but those were always taken. Now I just take whatever they give me and bring a book and expect to wait and wait. I’m not changing doctors because I actually like him and there just aren’t that many choices around here. I hate the staff though. They don’t even answer the phone half the time. It’s really frustrating.
I’m a former medical practice manager who went to part time a few weeks ago. I agree any wait more than 30 minutes is unacceptable. That being said, emergencies do arise in medical practices (at least in mine, they are on call for the ER and surgery and get called in a few times a month). However, we always communicate to patients right up front if the doc is running behind and offer them the opportunity to reschedule. Making patients consistently wait this long tells me they are overbooking. This may be due to an excessive number of patients or poor management. Sometimes it’s even at the doctor’s direction - they aren’t always the best business managers 
I agree with abasket that closing from 12-1 is helpful to my staff. We do stagger lunches but typically our last morning patient doesn’t leave the office until 12:30 and our first afternoon patient usually arrives early at 12:45. The short break allows to staff and physicians to return phone calls, get a bite to eat and regroup. My physicians typically schedule their newly diagnosed cancer patients over lunch as well (a consult that requires no staff assistance).
Pizzagirl, your husband’s schedule is impressive! My physicians strive for work-life balance (they’re all late 30’s/early 40’s with young kids). They start their days at 6 rounding at the hospital and between clinic and surgery, they usually leave by 5 or 6. They’re willing to make less money in order to achieve this.
When I went for my physical this year, I waited quite a long time. The doctor apologized, said that he had several patients this morning who had just been discharged from the hospital and he needed to make sure they understood their discharge orders. I booked the appointment right before lunch.
The doctor told me that there was a scheduled lunch hour but he usually has to use it to catch up. I like my doctor and when he saw me, he wasn’t rushing out the door. He took his time, I felt I mattered. I hate it when you see the doctor and he’s on his way out the door. I’m asking questions and he’s got his hand on the door. I ask questions because I want answers, I’m not making idle chitchat.
My H waits a long time for one of his specialists. He knows the drill and prepares. When H needed surgery (it was not related to what my H sees this doctor for) the doctor looked at his films and called a colleague to make sure that H was doing the right thing. He’s a wonderful doctor and we think he is absolutely the best doctor for my H. Worth the wait.
I am afraid that long waits when I go to any doctor are the norm, whether specialist or my internist or whatever they call them these days. I am amazed if I get in within a half hour, and a lot of the time the wait is an hour or more.
Abasket, I read my spouse your post and fwiw, this was his response:
- Staff meetings -- only once a month, but absolutely before office opens, shouldn't interfere with patients
- Call backs to patients -- if possible, squeeze a few in during the day, but otherwise bundle and do all at once
- Reading journals -- evening / weekend, not appropriate for office time
- Staff mental break - they have whatever breaks are mandated by law
- Charting -- done in the moment with EMR or saved up for the end of the day
- Conferring with specialists -- fairly rare, often done in person at the hospital instead of on the phone
- Restocking supplies / cleaning exam rooms -- that's behind the scenes and should be invisible to patients.
- Continuing education -- he has drug reps who come and bring lunch, but he won't give them more than 5 minutes of his time
- Practice management matters - irrelevant since he's solo practice, but when he did have partners, that was for evening / weekends
As a solo practitioner, he has office hours Mon - Sat and typically sees between 1 - 5 patients on Sundays (typically infertility patients who need procedures done at very specific times).
I asked him if a patient had an appointment at 10 am, what time she would be seen. He said she should be in his office by 10:10 at the latest. He sees them with their clothes on in his office, then they go to the exam room and disrobe, then after they get dressed again they come back to his office for any final questions. This is in contrast to most doctors around here where the woman is brought back, disrobes and the first encounter with the doctor is when she is undressed in the exam room.
I asked him what happens if a patient goes into labor or there is another emergency. The office staff calls everyone and gives them an estimated time delay, so they can decide whether they want to come later or reschedule, which seems reasonable. This is a lot easier now that everyone has cell phones – it was a lot harder when they didn’t!
His motto is that he can rest when he’s dead. This means no life – but he wouldn’t have it any other way. It’s really a calling. Well beyond any dedication I ever had to my job!!
Every doctor office I can think of around here is closed for an hour for lunch. Closed. No appointments. Answering machine message.
But it’s what is standard in this area so it’s not a surprise.
Best appointment times…first one in the morning…or first one after that lunch time.
I think an hour is ridiculous wait time. My eye doc double books every appointment…so two people for,each time. No wonder he gets behind!
I had an appointment this week at 9 and knew I wouldn’t be out of there before 11. My actual time with the staff there was less than 20 minutes. The rest was waiting around.
I have developed my own rule-of-thumb for waiting times/doctor visits: I should be checking out with the reception within an hour of my appointment. For instance, if the appointment is at 10, I should be finishing up with the front desk by 11. Any more time than that, I allow myself to get annoyed. The appointment might be a 15 minute visit and I’m kept waiting for 45 minutes, but if I get out of there within 60 minutes, all is good.
The infectious disease doc I saw kept me waiting well over 2 hours and then said basically I was too complicated and he recommended I go to Stanford instead! He charged me for the privilege of his sage referral–I didn’t need his referral and have no plans on seeing him again except under the most dire circumstances.
I’m tired of waiting for disorganized docs and offices. I don’t mind waiting for exceptional docs, where I know I will get the care I need.
I was treated at Stanford, UCSF and National Jewish in Denver. None of them had me waiting hours and none provided poor or inferior care. The copayment was the same for my local docs and the more famous clinics but wait times were generally better at the fabled clinics. I got better care from my Denver docs than any other docs I’ve seen and they tended to be quite prompt and apologized when the few times they ran late.
I get that docs are crunched for time, but I will not keep waiting and waiting for docs who provide poor care any more.
I have relatives that are docs and they try very hard to keep to their schedules and not allow staff to overbook them.
Your H sounds like a great guy and an excellent doctor @Pizzagirl! My comments are based on the 25+ doctor offices I work with on a regular basis and visually observing all of the things I mentioned happening on a fairly regular basis. So, not just things I supposing, but things I actually see happening in our community.
One way is isn’t right for all. As with most things, productivity - and inefficient productivity - can be measured by many factors and carry varying opinion. I personally think that in many positions, gulping a banana and a yogurt without a mental break is not necessarily wise - and also doesn’t make for a better worker.
I loved my pediatrician practice - the doc answered the phone himself every day from 8-9 am to answer nervous mom questions and/or determine if the child should be brought in for a visit. I could always get a same day visit. And he always called back within 10 minutes if I called after hours. I have no idea if he made any money because I had friends who complained that they could never get to see their doc or never got a call back etc.
My mom and I waited 3+ hours one time for a pre-op appointment with her cardiac surgeon. First a nurse took her and did BP etc. Then the PA came and reviewed a lot of info. Then the MD came. Every appointment it was at least a 2 hour process, for about 20 minutes with the doc. But he was world renown for this complicated surgery and he made you feel like he had all the time in the world. My mom’s surgery was delayed by an hour on the day of because he’d gotten a call at Easter dinner to operate on someone who had a burst aneurysm and he worked thru the night. So I made exceptions for people like that.
I once went to a disorganized dermatology office and they wanted my co-pay when I checked in. I had misgivings but since I had an early appointment I figured it couldn’t be that long of a wait. After 45 minutes they called me up and asked if I would switch and see the doctor’s “young and hot” son instead. Or there would be a further wait of at least 45 minutes!
I left and demanded my co-pay back. They were shocked. But really, I wanted to have a whole body skin check and there’s no way a young hottie is doing that. They were just beyond unprofessional and I didn’t go back.
That’s horrific CaliCash, I’d find a new doctor if I could. My dentist has called if he’s going to be late, and sometimes he calls and asks if I can come earlier.
@mathmom that’s how I run my dental office. We are almost always on time, rarely more than 10 minutes behind. Three days a week we take a lunch from 12-1 (full hour, enough time for me to go home), 4th day we work 11-6 straight.
My rule is that if I am 15 minutes or more behind, either the receptionist or I tell the patient the expected wait and offer to reschedule for another day. This rarely happens, but everyone appreciates the info. Today I had a young man in from 1000 miles away (long-term patient) to have his teeth cleaned and checked. He needed a filling so I squeezed him in, but that set me back a half hour. The patients after him both waited longer than usual, but they were okay with it.
I won’t wait more than an hour for most doctors.
Oh that’s right- my dentist is always running ridiculously behind. I expect to her to be at least an hour behind.
But, I stick with her because she has experience with Lupus patients and it’s too big of a pain to explain to new doctors all of my limitations. Sigh…