Exam room (not waiting room) wait times?

That is freaking crazy. No way would I wait that long. Hell, if I'm in there for over 20 minutes I'll go find someone.

I had one where I waited well over an hour in a freezing cold room in nothing but a paper gown and underwear. I didn't go back there. If you as a physician can't be bothered to see that your office has basic time management skills and respects patients' time, how can I trust you to thoughtfully manage my healthcare?

I waited a long time with my son who had his arm in a cast.  We were waiting to have the cast tken off. I finally poked my head out the door and discovered everyone had gone home. There was one person in a back office. The lights were off. The front door was open so we left. I still regret not taking a computer…

Most of the time, it is 10-30 minutes max. Once, at the doctor for a 4 pm appointment. I kept waiting and waiting and waiting and realized they HAD forgotten me - I poked my head out after about an hour and didn't see anyone, I walked down the hall and everyone was gone. I found a post it note and left a note on the monitor at the check in. Luckily, I didn't have problems getting out of the office. They called me the next day and was apologizing and apologizing & said they usually open all the doors before leaving to double check but no one that the day before. I don't how they forgot me but got me in right away the next day.

I always try for the first appointment of the day, or another very early one, to avoid this problem. One time though I actually walked out. I was at the Lombardi Cancer Center (a big name in cancer research and treatment, so it was always very busy) waiting for my doctor who was also a big name and who was the director of the breast cancer center at Lombardi. I waited and waited and waited...I don't remember how long. I put my head out once and was told "he'll be with you shortly". Waited and waited some more. Then I got dressed and told them I was leaving. 

Later that evening, after the center was closed, I had a phone call from the doctor -- the program director -- himself to apologize. Wow. He was a wonderful doctor, and just a kind person. He said there had been an emergency appointment that had to be squeezed in and he apologized again. I told him that I understood he was an oncologist and that if it had been me as the emergency I would have been relieved if he'd fit me in. None of that was a problem. I told him that the biggest issue was that no one had been in to say ANYTHING to me. Not to check in with me, not to explain what was going on, not to offer another appointment, nothing. He agreed, and said he was going to speak to the staff for the future. And he himself scheduled my next appointment while we were on the phone. lol

That's the only time it's ever happend to me thankfully. I have had to wait in the exam room for my retinologist for a bit longer than I might have liked, however mostly I schedule her first appointment of the day. But I don't mind waiting because I always take my Kindle. And I'm not waiting there while dressed only in some type of gown (at least at Lombardi they had cloth gowns that were big enough to cover everything). And I love her so much that I don't care about waiting...and I know one of the reasons I'm waiting is that she's busy explaining things to another patient in ordinary language that anyone can understand. 

I don't remember how long it was, but I finally opened the door and caught the doctor putting her coat on to leave. She then said she thought I had left. It was my last visit to that doctor ever.

I've never waited over maybe 15 minutes or so. And if it's longer, the nurse usually pops in and lets me know it will be a few more minutes. That's why I always take a book to read when I have a doctor's appointment.

I always kid my audiologist that she waits until I'm at a really good part in my book when she comes out to get me!

Longest? 3 hours. No i didn't go to that dr after that. Especially since he called me at work and berated me for leaving. After the 30 min wait in the waiting room I was taken to the exam room & then waited the 3 hours. I had to get back to work so I explained this to the staff and left. I was completely polite. The dr wasn’t even in the office yet. Apparently he was at the hospital comforting a family of a deceased patient and he felt the need to call me at work and berate me over leaving, that I should have waited and not wasted his time. I said that he was 3 1/2 hours after the appointment time and that it had been my time that was wasted, I told him I had to get back to work and hung up. I never went back. If he was a dr in the hospital even if he did spend 3 hours comforting family of a patient there was any number of staff who could have called his office & had the reschedule,

There was another time I walked out in a dr, he was 1.5 hours late and in the very next room bullshitting with a drug company rep. When I told the staff I was leaving I had to pick up my children, they had the gall to tell me he was tied up with an emergency. I said I was in the room next to him he’s not tied up with anything other than a drug company rep. Never went back there either. I don’t like being lied to.

Acceptable? 30 minutes TOPS without an impending emergency. A real emergency not a drug rep.

I would have left and found a new provider. Eff that. How much is their no show fee for patients?

We left a pediatrics practice after they left us hanging in an exam room for an hour (after sitting in the waiting room for 1/2 hour). I had 4 kids, one of whom was really sick and we were all just sitting there. It was terrible. I finally grabbed the kids and walked out. They ran after us saying they could see us now and I said "get the kids' records together because our new practice will need them." I had been there for 10 years - and no one even called us afterwards to apologize, nothing! There was a mass exodus from that practice around that time - nice doctors but the practice was managed really, really poorly.

In your shoes? I totally would've thought I was forgotten about!

That’s asking a lot of a 9 month old. Usually pediatricians have no food or drink signs except bottles/breastfeeding.
When my kids ere younger their ped had signs in every room that said if you’ve been waiting longer than 15 minutes please notify the front desk. I don’t remember esp long waits there.

When I used to get my mammogram and physician follow-ups at the James Cancer hospital I’ve waited 8 hours once so he could do a biopsy that day. Now I take a chance and do my mammo & us at a satellite location. Even though I went to school there and worked there I don’t want to deal with their parking.

I’ve had a few really long waits before, once over two hours which is insane. I didn’t have the option to reschedule in a timely way so I was stuck waiting.

My longest wait was 3 hours for an ophthalmologist. A typical visit was: Wait 1/2 hour in the waiting room. An optometrist then gets you, gives you a brief exam, then sends you to a backroom waiting room. There you wait another 1 - 2 hours while you hope that they didn't forget about you. When the ophthalmologist gets around to seeing you, he spends less than 5 minutes. I don't see this ophthalmologist anymore (he did my vision correction surgery over 15 years ago).

Sometimes my OB/Gyn is behind schedule cause he had to deliver a baby. I don't think I've waited more than an hour for him (he's been my doctor for over 30 years.)

In 2010-2011 era, while pregnant with my daughter, I waited on my OB doctor multiple times for 2 hours, two times for 4 hours and once for 5 hours!! She was commonly known to have long wait times but when she was with you, she would stop the world and not rush you. All her patients wanted her to deliver their babies and not someone on call. So if you were there when she had a patient need her for labor, a nurse might come in and tell you she just went into a c-section or labor and ask if you wanted to wait. My husband went and fetched dinner one time and also got the doctor dinner. We didn’t leave her office until 8:30pm from an afternoon appointment.

As much as I loved that doctor, I couldn’t wait that long for during my son’s pregnancy, so I switched doctors. My daughter was 4 and I often needed a babysitter. The babysitters were college girls and they had other things to do that wait on me with an open schedule.

That doctor took a break from practicing for awhile. I imagine she had burnout because she gave her soul to her patients.