PATIENT INFORMATION
Welcome to our practice. We hope that your relationship with our staff and physicians will be helpful and productive. Raleigh Infectious Diseases is a group of physicians who have special knowledge and training in the area of Infectious Diseases. We provide consultative services to you at the request of referring physician. We encourage all patients to obtain a "Primary Care Physician" and to contact those physicians for problems unrelated to your infection. We appreciate your confidence in our practice and would like to provide the following information in an effort to facilitate a positive doctor-patient relationship.
APPOINTMENTS
Due to the nature of our practice, most office appointments are scheduled in advance. The providers at Raleigh Infectious Diseases have very limited office appointments as most of their time is spent in the local hospitals. In case of an emergency, we will attempt to schedule you at the first available time with your own physician or with our nurse practitioner. Office schedules do not allow for "drop in" appointment times. Please call first and discuss your concerns with one of our nurses. We try to avoid prolonged wait times for our patients by allotting enough time for each patient to interact with their doctor. While we cannot always anticipate patient's problems, we try to avoid situations that delay your visit with your physician. Please let our office staff know if you are experiencing an excessive wait time. Please show our practice the same courtesy by arriving at least 15 minutes early for your appointment. Late patients will usually be rescheduled.
NO SHOW AND APPOINTMENT CANCELLATIONS
We appreciate the courtesy of your call in the event you are not able to keep your appointment so that we may schedule another patient during that time. A minimum of 24 hours is required for appointment cancellations. We reserve the right to terminate our relationship with patients who habitually do not keep their appointments.
TELEPHONE CALLS
Our telephone and voicemail system are necessary to handle the volume of phone calls to our office. Please listen to the options carefully and choose the one that best suits your needs. Most commonly used choices are Appointments (option 1), Prescriptions (option 5), Nurses (option 6) and Insurance (option 7). We will make every effort to return your call in an expedient manner. Please remember that your doctor spends little time in the office and we will call you back when we have information to report back. The more information you can share in your message, the quicker and easier it will be to respond appropriately to your call. Our receptionists do not have the medical knowledge to make suggestions regarding your healthcare. Please do not share medical information with them but instead leave a message on the nurse's voicemail.
PRESCRIPTION REFILLS
Please obtain prescriptions from your doctor at a scheduled office visit. However, if you need a refill, your need can be more easily met if you contact your pharmacist and have them call or fax us a refill request. Refill requests will be handled within 24 hours unless there is a problem and we notify you otherwise. Always check with your pharmacy first before calling the office. PLEASE do not wait until you are completely out of medication before calling your pharmacy and do not leave refill request on Friday afternoons as they will not be called in until Monday. Refill requests should be handled during regular office hours. Our physicians will not authorize refill requests on nights or weekends.
LABORATORY RESULTS
We encourage all patients to have routine labs performed prior to your appointment so that the results are available during your visit with your physician. We prefer that lab results be discussed with you during an office visit with your physician so that all questions and concerns can be addressed. If you are unable to have labs done prior to your appointment, please reschedule allowing enough time for results to become available. Lab reports will not be discussed with any patient unless your doctor has reviewed them.
EMERGENCIES OR ILLNESS AFTER HOURS
We prefer to treat our patients in the office where medical records are available. If possible, please notify our office during regular business hours if you are having problems. In the event of a medical emergency or if care is needed after hours, our physicians can be reached at #919-571-1567. Our answering service will notify our "on-call" physician or nurse who will attempt to call you back. Please note our office hours.
INSURANCE, DISABILITY and MEDICAL RECORDS
There are increasing numbers of forms that are requested to document disability and/or insurance benefits eligibility. Various documents request an enormous amount of information. Our policy is to provide adequate medical information pertinent to your request and must be accompanied by an authorization to release medical information. Should you need a copy of your medical records, an authorization to release medical records should be completed. Please allow 2 weeks for completion of forms.
HIPAA
Our office adheres to all requirements as defined by HIPAA (Health Information Portability and Accountability Act). Please ask to speak with our HIPAA Privacy Officer if you have any questions regarding this act and your privacy issues.