3 ms·

Well, I'm here in a major metro area of the US and it's 6 months or more for every doctor I try to see. Very difficult to get in to see anyone for anything.

pvarangot 4y ago
What's that major metro area? I'm in San Francisco and I have family in Boulder and in both primary care is like one or two weeks. Dermatology was a week and a half for me. A few months ago I needed imagining for a foot thing and it took three days for ultrasound and one week for an MRI. I thought this was the norm on big urban centers.
rayiner 4y ago
I live in a suburban area and I go to the doctor for completely random things for my kids because it’s so easy. I can get appointments to be seen within hours.
- pnutjam 4y ago
  Midwest, large city; pediatrician is same day, Allergist same week, Developmental Pediatrics was 4 months, Pediatric Ophthalmology was a year, it really varies. I'm lucky to have all these specialities available, people drive 2 or 3 hours to use the Midwest Eye Institute.
pnutjam 4y ago
Every "Family" doctor has stopped practicing or gone to a no insurance model that caters to wealthy people. You can only get "internal medicine" doctors for primary care. I've seen waits ranging from 4 months to a year, depending on what your dealing with. It's also impossible to get a 2nd opinion. The specialists all tend to belong to the same groups so you'll call a different doctor and eventually get shunted back to the exact same doctor you started out with. Where the the competition?
tptacek 4y ago
Chicago. My actual GP schedules months out. An appointment with "any doctor in their practice" is within a week. An appointment at their affiliated urgent-care takes hours, usually less. The correct strategy is to get a GP affiliated with an urgent-care, schedule a checkup with the GP, and, meanwhile, just go to the urgent-care for everything; they'll send records over to your doctor if there's anything complicated.
- kasey_junk 4y ago
  Chicago, I can make a televisit appointment to my primary care doctor typically with 1 day lead times. In person is typically 2 so he can schlep down to his office. He is a single practitioner with part time office and IT help. He recommends going to the minute clinic a block away from my house for most things that I can recognize and only calling him for a yearly consult which is a review of blood tests and a discussion about my health or for something the clinic didn’t figure out. This seems like a completely reasonable approach and I’m always surprised that it’s not the default.

pvarangot 4y ago

What's that major metro area? I'm in San Francisco and I have family in Boulder and in both primary care is like one or two weeks. Dermatology was a week and a half for me. A few months ago I needed imagining for a foot thing and it took three days for ultrasound and one week for an MRI. I thought this was the norm on big urban centers.

rayiner 4y ago

I live in a suburban area and I go to the doctor for completely random things for my kids because it’s so easy. I can get appointments to be seen within hours.

pnutjam 4y ago
Midwest, large city; pediatrician is same day, Allergist same week, Developmental Pediatrics was 4 months, Pediatric Ophthalmology was a year, it really varies. I'm lucky to have all these specialities available, people drive 2 or 3 hours to use the Midwest Eye Institute.

pnutjam 4y ago

Every "Family" doctor has stopped practicing or gone to a no insurance model that caters to wealthy people. You can only get "internal medicine" doctors for primary care. I've seen waits ranging from 4 months to a year, depending on what your dealing with. It's also impossible to get a 2nd opinion. The specialists all tend to belong to the same groups so you'll call a different doctor and eventually get shunted back to the exact same doctor you started out with. Where the the competition?

tptacek 4y ago

Chicago. My actual GP schedules months out. An appointment with "any doctor in their practice" is within a week. An appointment at their affiliated urgent-care takes hours, usually less. The correct strategy is to get a GP affiliated with an urgent-care, schedule a checkup with the GP, and, meanwhile, just go to the urgent-care for everything; they'll send records over to your doctor if there's anything complicated.

kasey_junk 4y ago
Chicago, I can make a televisit appointment to my primary care doctor typically with 1 day lead times. In person is typically 2 so he can schlep down to his office. He is a single practitioner with part time office and IT help. He recommends going to the minute clinic a block away from my house for most things that I can recognize and only calling him for a yearly consult which is a review of blood tests and a discussion about my health or for something the clinic didn’t figure out. This seems like a completely reasonable approach and I’m always surprised that it’s not the default.