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Thread: Doctors of RedsZone

  1. #1
    They call me "chef"
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    Doctors of RedsZone

    My mom ended up in the emergency room last night and was transferred to a hospital. Before looking at all her tests and reading her file, a doctor came into her room, sat at the foot of her bed, and told her "You're not on private insurance and I don't want to take you as a patient but I guess I will. No other doctor here is going to want to take you. I'm going to bill $2,000 for this and only get $200. If you end up needing this surgery, it's going to cost you $30,000. Can you afford that?"

    Luckily, my mom is a bad ass who has dealt with BS like this before and she calmly just nodded and let the doctor speak her peace and continue with her introductory intimidation. She also calmly listened as the patient advocate came in and, in less direct words, said the same thing as the doctor. Later, the doctor refused to run more tests, refused to let my mom switch to a doctor who did want to run tests, and tried to send my mom home with a 102 degree fever after receiving two bags of blood and no information about what is making her ill.

    As I said, my mom is uniquely built to deal with nonsense like this, so she ended up advocating for herself and they ended up backtracking and the nurses basically took over (doctor signed discharged papers, nurse and staff recommended against discharge) and have been giving her very good care but I was curious what other doctors or folks in the medical industry think about this. The nurses and patient advocate acted mortified (sincerely or not) when they heard what the doctor said to my mom and one of them firmly requested that my mom to recount this part of her experience in detail on her exit survey.

    This was not good, yeah?


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  3. #2
    Pitter Patter TRF's Avatar
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    Re: Doctors of RedsZone

    That is maybe the worst thing I have ever read.

    I hope your mom is doing well and kicks that doctor's ass.
    Dubito Ergo Cogito Ergo Sum.

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  5. #3
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    Re: Doctors of RedsZone

    One thing I'd look into is what is the doctors relationship to the facility, if the doctor is a contracted with the system then you could probably use that relationship to raise all sorts of hell with the system. If the doctor is not then you can make the doctors relationship hell. Either way that's not a good take on the system and I'd be all over their social media sites with this story and you will get some attention for sure.

    I work for an immense health care organization, we would get some serious hell for that.

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  7. #4
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    Re: Doctors of RedsZone

    Quote Originally Posted by westofyou View Post
    One thing I'd look into is what is the doctors relationship to the facility, if the doctor is a contracted with the system then you could probably use that relationship to raise all sorts of hell with the system. If the doctor is not then you can make the doctors relationship hell. Either way that's not a good take on the system and I'd be all over their social media sites with this story and you will get some attention for sure.

    I work for an immense health care organization, we would get some serious hell for that.
    Thanks for this! I'm trying to let her get back on her feet before I get a proper gauge on how far she'd want to take a complaint but I'm going to mention what you're saying about the doctor/hospital relationship. Historically, she isn't interested in blood or money and is usually happy to advocate for herself and take only the satisfaction of seeing people realize in real time that they've underestimated her.

    Some point after this initial introduction, my mom calmly told the patient advocate that if they didn't want her there because she wasn't going to make them much money, she would gladly leave and go to another hospital. She just asked that the current hospital put in writing the exact reason for her discharge (that she won't make them enough money). Immediately, they started to apologize and go in backtrack mode and, on her request, the nurses and staff phased the doctor out and took over. I got there after all that happened and, by that time, we had the nurse coming in and admitting to my wife and I that what my mom said was true, saying a lot of sentences that started with "I'm not the physician so I can't tell you this but...", and offering a lot of apologetic head nods seemingly on behalf of the system/doctor. One nurse said "it's my license on the line too" when confiding with us how they disagreed with the doctor's handling of things.

    Selfishly, the thing that bugged me most is that the doctor isn't dumb. They knew they were saying things they could get in trouble for but they were confident they could say them and intimidate my mom (and people who look like my mom) into complying and submitting. It's a for profit hospital in a poorer part of town with a huge Asian and Mexican non-English speaking community. Scaring and bullying patients must have worked in the past for the doctor to try it out on my mom. Fortunately, my mom is an older Mexican lady without private insurance but she's educated, street smart, and not hurting for money, so the shame tactics of calling her a poor nuisance who should accept the minimum care and feel fortunate for it didn't work. It pisses me off that it works on others who fit my mom's race and age are less well off.
    Last edited by Larry Schuler; 03-08-2019 at 01:57 PM.

  8. #5
    breath westofyou's Avatar
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    Re: Doctors of RedsZone

    That's a common practice at for profits, I work for Providence / St Joes so they don't cotton to that approach at all. They would shred a provider for that sort of behavior as it doesn't fall into their mission statement. Sounds like your mother would be happy knowing that it didn't happen to anyone else more than anything else and she certainly has the ammunition to try and make that a reality.

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    Re: Doctors of RedsZone

    Had a doctor once interrogate me in an urgent care when I had strep throat about what I did for a living and how I was going to pay him. Think I was like 23? Pretty good!

    There are good doctors out there, but so many are miserable people.

    I couldn't love how your mom handled that anymore. She is awesome.
    Turning and turning in the widening gyre
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    Re: Doctors of RedsZone

    Hospital tried that crap when my grandmother broke her hip in November, after 2 days there they were going to discharge her. My mom had to threaten to sue them, because there was no way they were going to send her home (where she lived by herself).

    The hospital immediately changed course and agreed to keep her, while everyone decided what to do.

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  14. #8
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    Re: Doctors of RedsZone

    Quote Originally Posted by Kinsm View Post
    Hospital tried that crap when my grandmother broke her hip in November, after 2 days there they were going to discharge her. My mom had to threaten to sue them, because there was no way they were going to send her home (where she lived by herself).

    The hospital immediately changed course and agreed to keep her, while everyone decided what to do.
    I'm not up to date on medical laws but a family friend said that, if a hospital discharges someone too early and they re-enter care within 36 hours, the discharging hospital can lose the money they'd make from the services they issued. Does that sound right to anyone? He attributed the patient advocate's immediate change in attitude to that, after my mom casually offered to leave and go somewhere else right away.

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    Re: Doctors of RedsZone

    Quote Originally Posted by Larry Schuler View Post
    if a hospital discharges someone too early and they re-enter care within 36 hours, the discharging hospital can lose the money they'd make from the services they issued. Does that sound right to anyone?
    Yes.
    "Even a bad day at the ballpark beats the snot out of most other good days. I'll take my scorecard and pencil and beer and hot dog and rage at the dips and cheer at the highs, but I'm not ever going to stop loving this game and this team and nobody will ever take that away from me." Roy Tucker October 2010

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    Re: Doctors of RedsZone

    This is all scary. As a nearly-finished doc student, I'm currently uninsured and have chosen to go with a local clinic's reduced prices rather than more expensive ACA insurance, and this leaves me vulnerable to medical emergencies. I've never run into medical professionals that acted like this, and it frightens me that this happens. Your mom being strong kept her from being run over by the system, but you have to wonder how many don't have the ability to push through.
    It is on the whole probable that we continually dream, but that consciousness makes such a noise that we do not hear it. Carl Jung.

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    Re: Doctors of RedsZone

    I asked by parents who are in their late 80's, and they never heard of a doctor acting like this either. Even in the few times I went to the ER, no one beyond the front desk asked me even if I had insurance or not. Report this doctor.

  19. #12
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    Re: Doctors of RedsZone

    My question is does Chef's Mom have Medicare or any other insurance?

  20. #13
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    Re: Doctors of RedsZone

    Quote Originally Posted by Sea Ray View Post
    My question is does Chef's Mom have Medicare or any other insurance?
    She has Medi-Cal.

  21. #14
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    Re: Doctors of RedsZone

    I assume most every hospital accepts Medi-Cal? If this hospital did then I don't see the problem. I also don't see why the doctor is getting involved with finances. Leave that up to someone else. If he works for a hospital that takes Medi-Cal then he'll have to live with what it pays. Very inappropriate. Sorry you had to experience that

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    Re: Doctors of RedsZone

    Quote Originally Posted by Larry Schuler View Post
    My mom ended up in the emergency room last night and was transferred to a hospital. Before looking at all her tests and reading her file, a doctor came into her room, sat at the foot of her bed, and told her "You're not on private insurance and I don't want to take you as a patient but I guess I will. No other doctor here is going to want to take you. I'm going to bill $2,000 for this and only get $200. If you end up needing this surgery, it's going to cost you $30,000. Can you afford that?"



    This was not good, yeah?
    Sounds like a doctor who is knee deep in Student Loan debt, car debt, boat debt, house debt........and is miserable.
    * Attended the 1990 and 2010 Reds Division clinchers *

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