Making Doctors Appointments

Post Reply New Topic

Greetings,

Its been quite a while since Ive been here.

My mother recently started a new job with great health/dental/vision insurance and being under 26, I qualify until January. Either way since Im over 18 I have to be the one to call and make appointments and so forth. Im in fine health, my last physical was in 2004 with a doctor whose specialty is adolescents so I can no longer see him. My mother insists that I have the full workup to make sure i am indeed healthy. I have not had any "treatment" for aspergers since i was in my early teens, Im HF enough that is barely even noticeable to people.

Ive always hated calling people I dont know. Ive found it to be an incredible pain in the rear to get established as a new patient. The doctors I happen to know in the community either dont accept my insurance or are not taking new patients. So basically I have a list of approved doctors and their specialties. I feel like I should be doing some kind of homework as opposed to "pulling a name out of a hat" and cold calling them. I wish there were an online system where you simply put in personal info, insurance, specific concern and so on and the computer spits out an appointment time.

I think our society is doing a disservice to people by not teaching them the ins and outs of things like this in school. Getting work done on a car is needlessly complicated. Finding prices for tires online was a pain in the butt. Getting dental work has been nothing but trouble. Whats next? Will I need a colonoscopy to qualify for a library card?

I wish they did teach life skills such as making appointments and how to arrange for services that a person might need like car repair, how to find an electricity company, and get water set up etc. This is why I am happy that I lived at home while I went to college.

I am assuming you live in the United States, as the way you are describing insurance sounds like the way insurance works in the United States currently.

Unfortunately you are probably going to have to randomly pick a name off the list and call. You might ask people you know to see if any of them are familiar with any of the doctors and like them. As for an over all physical, and establishing a relationship with a doctor you can go to if you get sick you are going to want to see either a doctor whose specialty is either Family Medicine or an Internal Medicine (these are general practice doctors who will see adults).

In all likelihood most of them will not care that you have Asperger's, they will be focusing on your overall physical health, illnesses, blood pressure, diabetes, etc. A general physical will not take long, and will probably tell you that you are healthy, but it will give the doctor baselines for future visits. Like for me, I normally have a fast heart rate, this will let the doctor know that if I come in sick and my heart rate is 110 (fast for most people), not to worry, but if my heart rate is 70 (normal for most people) that could be very bad.

I am sorry that you had so much trouble with the dentist and your tires. For me, if I have a tire problem, I put on the spare if needed (but it is a smaller tire so I cannot drive far or fast on it) and I go to Discount Tires, where I get a good price for the tires (I checked that out on the internet to find out what I could expect to pay).

I have trouble going to doctors appointments on my own, so I definately have trouble phoning up and making doctors appointments!

I really should just get my arse in gear and try to do these things on my own, because I know I can do it, but it's just plucking up the courage which is the most difficult part, probably for most young people, but I seem to be getting older so quickly and still relying on my parents to do everything for me. I'll be 22 next week, and I do feel ridiculous when my mum phones a friend up and says, ''I'll have to cancel tomorrow's plans, I'm going with my daughter to a doctors appointment.''

I had this same issue with the bus. When I first left school, I was very stubborn about getting the bus on my own. I kept saying, ''you will never catch me getting the bus on my own! I am not going to college if it means I'll have to get buses on my own! I am not doing it!'' And now it's almost 5 years later and I've been getting the bus on my own since, and now that particular bus has become my obsession and I'm even close to dating one of the bus-drivers! Can you imagine that?

I kind of have to do that, to do something at all, I kind of have to become a partial expert (when I rode buses in Houston, I learned which buses were pipelines, etc, etc) And congratulations on the budding friendship/romance possibility with the driver.

@nebrets
Yes, I am in the US. You made good points i forgot to mention, utilities etc. That reminds me of the first time I got a bank account. I dont remember that to be a particularly arduous process, except that I tried to go through the drive through to do it

I did end up picking someone at random. There was one Internal Medicine practice that other family members use that I wanted to get into but they were closed to new patients.

As for getting work done on my car, I needed a small plastic piece for the cooling system, it was loosing coolant and overheating because that piece was cracked. I also bought the car with four studded snow tires on it which became illegal April 1st. Getting the cooling system repaired was simple enough, my mother knows a good mechanic. Getting tires was a royal pain. I dealt with some of the most defensive people. I thought that the purchase of tires included mounting and balancing. Some do some dont and NOBODY specifies on their website. Many of the websites dont even list prices.

Heck, just buying a car was a nightmare. I have bad credit, I was stupid as a young adult. I have two collection accounts and one closed credit card that I was late on once so the bureau considers it a "negative" account. I want to establish credit but I cant even get a walmart card. I went to one of those places that approves everyone (except me apparently). They submitted my info to the credit provider, told me that the offers would come in and they would call me within two hours. Next day they called and said nobody offered me financing. The only way they would sell me a car is if i had cash. I was able to get financing from the "First National Bank of Grandma" and found a decent car in a private sale with only a couple minor issues.

Why cant every business use "menu board" pricing? Even car insurance quotes are ridiculous. Company A offered me a rate of $350 per six months for full coverage. Company B offered me a rate of $600 per 6 mo for liability only. Company C offered me $450 for liability plus roadside assistance, now I have two companies filling my email box with junk about how they save EVERYBODY 15% on their insurance.

Be careful, I cant speak for all of them, but some of the bus drivers in my area are kind of shady. I should know, I took the bus for many years.

I think coach-drivers on holiday excursions are worse because they are far away from where they live and where you live, and they seem to think they can get away with getting off with anybody, simply by giving ''the eye''. It hasn't happened to me, but it has happened twice to a very gullible aunt of mine. She's in her 50s but still doesn't seem to learn her lesson (even though she's got emotionally hurt twice).

One of the local tour bus companies will not send female drivers on the long distance runs, four separate female drivers were prostituting themselves on the overnight stays. (I know, men can commit crimes too, but the women always seemed to get caught)