PCP referral letter - frustrated (Vent)

Warning: Venting

My surgeon's office gives us a "form" letter to take to our PCP as a sample for what they should send for the letter to the insurance. Included on that form letter is one paragraph (clearly marked) where they formally request that the insurance company consider you for surgery. That is the only thing the surgeon asks that they please included on the letter.  The rest of it is just a suggested format to use and things to include. 

Well, my surgeon's office called today and they received both mine and my husband's letter from the PCP today. Neither one of the letters had anything formally requesting that we be considered for surgery, and my husband's letter says that he has only been a patient of hers since August 2013 and has only had one diagnosis of bronchitis in that time! We have both been patients of this doctor since 2002!!! My husband has a-fib and high blood pressure (for which she has prescribed him medication!) and is on 5 different prescription meds from his cardiologist (which we discussed at the appointment when we requested the letters).

I know they recently switched over to a new computer system, but that is no excuse for them getting something THIS wrong! Ugh! I am so upset. It is going to be a pain to try to get her to re-do the letters and I need to have them turned in by April 4th in order for us to stay on track for the surgery dates that we have scheduled.

I need to call the PCP's office tomorrow, or I'm thinking of just going over there but I'm afraid I might not be too nice to them in person.  Perhaps actually going there would help make sure that they do something ASAP to correct the letters though.  I could take the form letter to them again and maybe highlight the sentence that requests the insurance company considers us for surgery :P

I would recommend go in personal  and try to be  nice though lol  but if they see you in person they will do it

i had this problem  that my doctor was not sending the pcp letter by fax and i was calling and calling till i went in person and asked the secretary to please gave me a copy of the letter or fax it in front of me

and they did, everything worked fine after that. 

I would personally go to the office and speak to the Office Manager.  Let them know your timeline so they will fix this right away.  I know people can make mistakes but this is not good.  They need to correct this and your going in person should set a fire to make this happen for you and your husband.  I wish you both the best!

Kill 'em with kindness baby - kill em' with kindness.

Oh, and one more: You'll attract more bees with honey than you will with vinegar!

Ok - no more of those.

That is all.

I typed up my own letter (with my own history of illnesses) based on the form letter and took the hard copy to my pcp and emailed a copy to them also so they could use it to cut and paste into their own letter.  My doc looked at my letter and compared it to my chart and signed it.  

Thank you!  That is what I had pretty much decided to do by this morning and your message confirmed to me that is what I should do.  I worked with the referral specialist from my surgeon's office and typed up a letter which I have ready to take to them and hopefully they will approve it and sign it.   Of course, they are closed today, so I have to wait until tomorrow morning to take it in to them but I feel much better about it now. 

Hi Sonja I wanted to ask you a question , i know  you had surgery with Sosa same as me but wanted to know what hospital you had surgery ?

Hi Manny, I had my surgery at Palmetto General Hospital.  Did you have your surgery yet?

my surgery will be on April 8 :) my insurance approved me  yay but they sent me to memorial west hospital  hehe 

Memorial West is ok!