How can I get Docs to communicate?
 

I've been chugging along this year, thinkingthat my 3 main docs: GP, Neuro and Ocon were updating each other. Well, I found out after my recent 'annual' GP visit [the doc I see least], that NO feedback, updates, tests or anything...Zip Zero and Zilch has been sent to the office. This is scary!
DOES ANYONE HAVE SUGGESTIONS on how I can get my other docs to update the GP? The GP is gonna be the one on call if I've problems and not getting current info from the others is giving me BAAD goosebumps.
How have you all dealt with this form of cat herding syndrome? Please, HELP!?!?!?!? Surely, this can't be all that hard!

Thanks!- j

Doctors are supposed to write reports about patients. I've seen doctors tape record things in session just to write a report on. Generally speaking the doctors send these reports to other doctors.
Did you try requesting with the secretary to send reports??

It's so frustrating when doctors don't communicate. Especially when the primary care doctor is the one left in the dark since that doctor is supposed to be the one who knows the most and puts al the pieces together.

I don't know if the things I do will help you....

First, anytime I go for any test (blood, imaging studies, etc...) I tell the facility that is doing the testing to send a copy of the results to my PCP. I also ask the doctor who is ordering the testing to write "CC to Doctor X" on the order (doctor X is the primary care doctor).

This helps to make sure that the PCP gets the copies of the results, and if the PCP does not get a copy it gives him the authority/permission to request a copy from the facility without me having to sign medical release forms.


Second, anytime I see my specialists I ask them at the end of the visit "When will Doctor X receive a copy of the notes/chart from this visit?" It's a subtle way to remind them to remember to send my primary care doctor the notes.


Third, whenever I see a new specialist, I make sure that I sign the medical release form thing to make sure that they have permission to send chart notes and info to my primary care doctor. The HIPAA laws made it more difficult for doctors to talk to each other about a patient without the patients permission, so I always make sure that the signed permission/release form is part of the paperwork I fill out when I see a new specialist.


Fourth, I take my own notes when I see a specialist. Name of the doctor, type of specialty, date of visit, reason for visit, results of visit, any changes in doagnosis or medication or treatment, etc... My notes are very brief and it takes less than 5 minutes to write them when I get home from seeing a doctor. I keep all these notes in one place (I use my DayPlanner that I use as a symptoms/pain/medical journal).

When I see my PCP I bring these notes with me and make sure that the PCP is up to date on everything that has happened since the last time I was there.


The last thing I do is that every year I send a medical release form to every doctor, hospital, testing facility, etc.. that I have seen in the past year and I request that they send me a full and complete copy of my chart for the past year. I usually do this in October because my birthday is in October and it's easy to remember.

This past October, I sent my release at the end of October and the release asked for copies of everything that occured from September 2005 to the present. I ask for the overlap just to make sure that I am getting everything.

I keep these copies in my filing cabinet at home, and if a see a new doctor that needs past information or if one of my current docors is missing information I go to Kinkos or Staples and make copies to give to them, but I always keep a complete copy for myself. I have to pay a "copying fee" every year to each doctor for each page that they copy, and then I have to pay for postage or go to pick it up myself - but it's not a lot of money and it's worth it to make sure that I have a full copy of everything.


I hope that helps.

Take care,
Liz

Thanks...it's always NOT easy?
 

Optimumeg...keep in mind...I AM TRAINED and by the best...I can ask till my ears fall off-it makes for zeroes if nothing happens! I'd asked, was assurred that yes...a, b & c were happening. Had it NOT been for the fact that I did NOT expect all to happen as it should, I would NOT have had copies of recent blood tests in tow for the GP. Well, OK in a way, I've 2-5 docs at a time requesting test results...and I KNOW not all of them are going to get them. SOO I ask for a copy. It's a matter of how to designate to whom which/what responsibilities! I'm not Mad mind you, I just want to oil the wheels of 'administration' the best way possible!

My docs KNOW I am trained, and, in turn have 'trained' them... to a degree...It's just getting that next critical step [to me, at least] that's not getting thru STAFF brains?

Whittesea/Liz - I believe you know I am sort of trained about these things...thing is...I thought I'd gotten my DOCS trained...and now find I've been 'melvined'? You have an idea of my take on things....Believe me, every 6 months I get cy's from the pertinent folks to add to my file...

The other issue is getting my FILE in order...Liza Jane, Please, do you come to homes to do 'file Makeovers? The paper is not only getting out of control...I am afraid it will mutate and multiply!

Umm, err, do you pick up on a tad of frustration percolating here?

Thanks one and all, I think phone calls...followed by 'nice letters' will be the current order of the day...[w/cc to ME of course!]

Liz, the overlap thing is brilliant...so many reports come in 'after' or 'before' the times specified!

I think that this is one of the most frustrating tasks for any patient that has more than 1 doctor! And then there are the insurance companies to deal with on top of the doctors' offices. I too stand there and watch while the doc, or sometimes their MA or nurse, indicates on the form who the results should go to, and they are still not sent. That leads me to believe it is the transcriptionist or a file room clerk making the error. But, it happens and Liz has some great ideas for preventing it!!! Thanks Liz.

Our small town is growing quickly and if I see a specialist here, I know they will be able to just pull my file as everything is scanned and loaded into a system they (the offices) all have access to. We just had our hospital open last January and if the docs have offices attached to the hospital, they have the program. Most medical doctors have moved into these offices so it makes it nice and easy dealing with them. Too bad I have several out of town!

Later all,
nancyh

<<The other issue is getting my FILE in order...Liza Jane, Please, do you come to homes to do 'file Makeovers? The paper is not only getting out of control...I am afraid it will mutate and multiply>>

LOL. How I wish I had the resources to do makeovers. Just sitting is hard enough, but my BIL died last week, and helping my sister deal with the paperwork that's tumbled onto her lap is the best I can do. And even there, not nearly as I'd wish I could.

Dahek
 

Leaf Blower.......

(seirously - I keep a "temp" folder of all my tests, notes, etc... which I always request at a visit if I can - and then enter in my lizajane spreadsheets when I have the time and put the original tests into 3 ring binders I've got set up by type of test or type of doc, etc. in chron order)


(do your spread sheets!!!!!!!):) :)

I work for a doctor and he daily has letters typed and sent to other doctors, sometimes it is just the doctor you go too. When I go to other offices, I realize how well we run ours. I work for an optomitrist and sometimes we need to call the opthamologist's office we work with and ask them to fax us a prescription for eyewear and even if I tell them the patient is here waiting, they will ignore me and it really bothers me. We never are like that. On the other hand, sometimes it is not the doctor who is at fault, well, in a way he/she is because they should run a well staffed office, but often, it's the doctor's staff that fails you.

Sometimes I truly wonder what is happening to our world.

It makes you wonder how they like to be treated when they have to go to a doctor. Ill bet they want better than they give. Keep up your good work, you may not get many thanks but there are people who will appreciate it.

".....but often, it's the doctor's staff that fails you."

Too true, too sad.
Most of my docs are in the same hospital system,Johns
Hopkins Medicine (altho thier offices may be physically miles from one another) . My records are available to them at any time they pull up my file-opthamologist, neurologist, PCP, orthopedics, etc.
It amazes me that when I go for a PCP visit, she has no records or notes sent to her about additions to my file from other docs. I've signed all the releases and checked all the boxes and written my PCP's name at the proper place for copies to be forwarded, but many times she has to wade through the files to pull up what she should have gotten in the first place.
But at least she can get to them. She's learned how to navigate the system.
That's one advantge to keeping all my docs within the same system.

I've recently learned that there is a type of doc that is supposed to coordinate an entire medical 'team' for body-wide treatment of certain types of problems. Usually sports related or neuro muscular-skeletal, but can be within the realm of other treaments too- a physiatrist. Seems as if getting one of these 'in your pocket' could solve a myriad of communication problems.