I’m going to start this off by going against that statement above and say that yes, I understand that the health care providers are overworked and often borderline robbed by the insurance agencies via negotiated discounts.
But that doesn’t mean that they have to be asses.
I took my oldest in for a dental cleaning this morning, it went well as a 4 year old’s dental cleaning can be expected and the I booked him another appointment.
Given he’s in pre-school in the mornings now and I a) find that vastly more important than his dental visit and b) am paying actual money to have him in those pre-school classes, I’m hesitant to pull him out of them early for other activities. The school’s dedicated time to teach him, we committed to time for him to be there, screw you third party.
So I was a bit taken aback when the pinched face blonde behind the counter gave me “well they usually prefer to do the younger patients in the morning” line and pushed me into an early morning appointment instead of the afternoon one I requested.
Irritated, several hours later I called back and instead asked for an afternoon appointment. Worse comes to worse I could get him a morning appointment on a morning he doesn’t have school, but he’ll be 4 day in the fall, so I’d rather just get it in the afternoon.
Again, I get “well Dr. ____ usually prefers to do the younger patients in the morning but…” and I got an early afternoon appointment.
Let me share a secret with you, Mr. Dentist man.
Ready? Move closer….
IT’S NOT ABOUT YOU.
See that right there? Simple truth. You’re treating a human being, I’m sorry if I’m impeding your tee time or your drug rep time. But my son’s a human being, and as his father I’m charged with setting priorities that help HIM, not you.
I put his education before other things, and if you don’t like it, there’s a whole phone book full of other dentists trying to pay off their student loans.
OK, off my soap box for a little while.