A tale of two patients

[Guest guest]

I just got this article today from my chief at Kaiser. It is being sent

to all the So. Calif. Kaiser physicians and is a troublesome indictment

of the current medical system, not just Kaiser's. Kaiser, actually, is

better than most large HMOs, but that's my limited opinion. Ironically,

while I'm sure the purpose of circulating it is to inspire the

physicians at Kaiser to give better service, the main problem in the

article was not the quality of service given by the doctor - it was the

system which overbooked the doctor so much that he was running 2 hours

behind. It sounds like he was a very thorough doctor, but probably took

longer than the allotted appointment time (to give good quality of

care!). Actually, I could easily have been that doctor. Now I'm more

like the second doctor. Last week I schedule at patient at 8 PM. I took

the call at 7:40 PM. I even like dogs (read the article).

And that's why I believe those in charge of the current major medical

systems can't effect the necessary changes to improve medical care. The

problem is not the doctor, it's the system. They just don't get it.

For those of you who can't read attachments, I uploaded the article to

http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group//files/.

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Seto, MD

South Pasadena, CA