Our pediatrician had separate waiting rooms for well children and sick children.
Same as ClaremontMom’s pediatrician’s office, ours had 2 separate waiting rooms. I loved that place! The docs and nurses were amazingly caring and genuinely loved kids. We stuck with that place for as long as we could.
Our primary has a well visit and a sick visit waiting room.
Years ago we called our pediatrician because my daughter had a severe case of chicken pox. Pox everywhere including rectum and ear canals. The doc had us bring her in through the back emergency exits. And saw us the moment we got there. It made others wait but hopefully protected them.
@KKmama Ours too. We’ve got that well room, sick room, and an infant room. And we also had to do that back door entry when D1 had chicken pox. We’ve been with that practice for 25+ years and probably had our last well visit/shots update for S now that he’s 18. It has changed a ton over that time. But my favorite ped has been there throughout. Another thing that changes when they grow up. D went to our PCP. S said he’d like to go there too. It’s time.
Our pediatrician had the same note. What they meant was they didn’t want you bringing the very sick child into the waiting room. They had a separate waiting room or if it was something like chicken pox they had you wait in the Dr office. Wait times varied. I knew if we had to wait it was because someone else’s child had an emergency.
My OB/GYN was always at least an hour wait. Once she stopped her OB practice the wait was usually half that. My present Gyn is also bad. I always have to wait and her office staff isn’t the sharpest. She is excellent and I continue to see her. The orthopedist we use is terrible. Waits can be over an hour. My D had a broken wrist in HS and she would get so mad. On several occasions she wanted to just leave. He was a kind man and I think he wanted to fit everyone in and not rush them.
My internist now is rarely a wait and if she is running late she will come out and apologize. She is an independent practioner and believes in scheduling enough time with each patient. I don’t think she makes a ton of money.
We loved my D’s neurologist. He was like clockwork. I don’t think in the 8 years my D saw him we ever waited. He would also come out to call you into the exam room.
I appreciate the Dr who runs on time. It is one of the reasons I prefer not to see a Dr at the large conglomerate medical group in my city. Sadly my insurance has drastically reduced the number of solo or small group practices On the preferred provider list.
All of you who love your pediatricians, no need to find a new doc yet, wait till the kid is starting his own family!
http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2016/06/23/leaving-the-pediatrician-not-at-26/?_r=0
If our ped had a second door or sick room, they never said. That’s why I got about 15 years of eyerolling from the door note. And they’re a very respected practice.
The thing about our primary group is they very much work as a team, incl doctor to doctor. If you really need to come in and yours isn’t available, another doc, PA, or NP will see you. Contrast that with others, especially specialists.
Our pediatrician’s office had well and sick waiting rooms, too, but one time when I brought in my daughter with pinkeye, the other parents in the sick child waiting room screamed at me for daring to expose their children to something so contagious.
What was I supposed to do, not get medical care for my child because of the risk to their children?
We left our pediatrician after he found our kids too complicated and wanted them to go to a psychologist, tho they had already seen several who were unanimous that their issues were physical not emotional or mental.
Fortunately, our allergist was willing and happy to serve as their primary and deal with their complicated medical issues. We are very fond of her and she is a member of my nonprofit’s Board of Directors.
She has been very interested in how specialists D has seen in Los Angeles and Stanford have treated D, as the allergist gets many complicated patients.
In some cases, you never have to leave the pediatrician! One of my main doctors is a pediatrician. I see him because he specializes in the rare disease I have and many of the complications of the disease are childhood illnesses.
Don’t know your age, @notelling, but I give you credit for being an adult in the kiddy waiting rooms. Guess you can look like a parent 
Are wait time problems really worse at the larger medical groups? It seems like most of the wait time problem stories here are from solo or small group practices.
In HI, most docs are (or were–ACA is causing medical centers to put some MDs on staff) solo or very small group (depending on what is meant by small).
When my son was three, I took him to the ped’s office for a checkup. He lived up to his nickname of “Disaster Boy” by falling off a short step stool and splitting his chin open. The doctor said, “We don’t do stitches here, so you’ll have to take him to the ER.” Really?!? With an infant and a six-year-old to tow along, too? So we went directly to the ER and waited a couple of hours. I remember a cop bringing in a non-cooperative person in handcuffs. When the ER doctor finally came in, she took one look at him and said, “Oh, he doesn’t need stitches, he’ll be fine.” 
Nice for her, as long as she was the one driving herself there. But if she wasn’t the one driving, then I wonder how happy the person was who had to take her to these appointments? (That’s assuming they didn’t get paid.)
Good for your friend for making a stink! Around here, I often see signs that if a patient is more than 15 minutes late to an appointment, then they have to reschedule. But you do get 15 minutes leeway.
There are also signs that if an appointment isn’t cancelled by 24 hours before the appointment, then there will be a charge. Now I wonder if latecomers who end up having to reschedule their appointment also have to pay that charge.
I once had to call and tell my internist I was running late because my battery died. They told me to come anyway and they’d fit me in, so after AAA jumped my car, I got there and they did see me, having me wait as usual. I’ve otherwise generally been very prompt for my appts and call if for any reason I’m running late.
I’ve seen Stanford tell folks who are late they missed and have to wait until the next opening, but they seemed to be fairly prompt with appointments from the ones we had there.
My D has had to pay $50 or $100 from accidentally missing an appointment–her regular copay is $15, so she didn’t make that mistake more than once!
Some people legitimately don’t mind. My best friend usually takes me for my rheum and infusion appointments. The infusions easily take 3+ hours and the rheum appoints to drive and everything around the same time or more.
I am happy and able to take myself to the rheum appointments but usually either he or one of my parents (who live 4 hours away) will insist on taking me. They usually bring books or their phones/tablets and get some work or leisure done. Luckily, you only to go to the appointments a few times a year unless you’re in the middle of a full blown flare.
Regarding pediatricians: do most people usually go to them until they’re in their late teens. I literally don’t remember going to a pediatrician and I know I’ve been going to a regular PCP since at least the age of about 8. I can’t remember too much before that.
My kids and I liked our 2nd pediatrician until he decided they were too complicated. We remained friendly after that, but I was very hurt he abandoned us in our time of great need.
I will be forever grateful to our allergist for stalwartly sticking with us and helping us find specialists that could help.
Medical care can be very time and energy consuming. I feel like the first half of this year has been spent on my medical care and my parents and our D’s. It has been a exhausting and expensive.
These days a lot of doctors in my area are part of large practices associated with hospital networks, they are medical mega businesses. I had a urological issue that needed surgery, and when I saw the specialists at their office, it was chaos and took hours…but when I went into the hospital itself, it was like a military operation, by the book, it was pretty amazing, so why the office was such a quagmire doesn’t make sense, they use the same tracking software, it is all integrated, but for example I was scheduled for an ultrasound, they fouled up, I had checked in, 2 hours later they said they didn’t have me on the schedule for the ultrasound, saw the doctor, was just about to leave and they called my name to do the ultrasound…and then they had to find a doctor to do it, because the original one had left…
Private doctors have the same problem, if they are seeing clients from insurance companies they are cramming in a ton of patients, too, because of the negotiated fee structure. When I had some work done that wasn’t covered by insurance (it was plastic surgery), I never had that problem, or with doctors who didn’t deal with the insurance directly, it always happens when they are part of the network.