When the office is closed, one of the
doctors is available to take urgent calls until it reopens the next day. They
communicate closely to make sure your child’s primary doctor is aware of any
problems. If you have an emergency, you can speak with the doctor on call by
calling the regular office number. You will be instructed on how to reach the
answering service. Explain your child's problem to them. They will then contact
the doctor, who will return your call. If the problem is very severe they will
try to reach us right away. Once in a while there is a problem with the paging
system. If you have not been called back within the hour, please call the
answering service back.
A final note about after-hours phone
calls. We want to be available to our patients when they have urgent problems; but, we tend to get a lot of phone calls, especially during the winter
months. After-hours calls are for URGENT medical problems only. Non-urgent
problems, long term problems, and prescription refills will only be taken care
of during regular office hours.
Unless there is a true emergency,
please do NOT take your child to the emergency room without calling us first.
Often this trip can be prevented, saving your child needless trauma and saving
you time, money, and aggravation.
An emergency is a situation that
requires immediate intervention to prevent injury or loss of life. If this
is a true EMERGENCY then call 911 and go to the nearest Hospital.
With the current popularity of
managed care plans, there are many restrictions on use of emergency rooms and
urgent care centers. It is your responsibility to know what centers or hospitals
you can use. We currently accept more than 30 managed care plans and cannot
memorize all of the requirements.