Top Screwups Doctors Make and How to Avoid Them: Health care screwups are one of the leading causes of death in America, killing as many as 750,000 people annually. That’s more than heart attacks or cancer. And yet most people don’t know this, including most physicians. From diagnostic disasters to deadly drug interactions, the bestselling authors of The People’s Pharmacy expose the alarming epidemic of medical mistakes in America—and offer a lifesaving prescription to make the healthcare system safe again. Only $26.00 +s/h
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Q. I sat in the waiting room at a local doctors’ office for hours while a relative was having tests. An amazing number of pharmaceutical reps waltzed in all day pushing dollies of samples. They waved to the front desk as they went back to restock the samples. I also noticed a lot of food being delivered while I was there. The nurse said that pharmaceutical reps keep the staff well fed with cookies, brownies, pizza, BBQ, chicken, and the like. It seems to me there is something wrong with this picture.
A. The pharmaceutical industry spends an extraordinary amount of money promoting medications to physicians. One way to get in good with the office staff is to provide lunch. We hear that in some doctors’ offices the staff expects lunch to be provided for everyone and complains if the food doesn’t meet certain standards. These “Lunch and Learn” sessions are one way sales reps get face time with busy doctors, but the free lunches will ultimately be paid for at the pharmacy when patients pick up their prescriptions.
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I went to a very large practice in Houston for years, spending hours in the infusion lab, getting courses of chemo--the drug companies delivered catered meals 3 or more times a week, with such abundance that we regulars were often offered food and drink!
In the 60's in Buffalo, I once spent over 3 hours past my apointment time in a doctor's office while he laughed it up (the office door was open and I could see this) with a pharmaceutical rep.
My roommate at the time was an attorney and, at his advice, I took the doctor to small claims court for the lost time.
I had to produce witnesses, show that I could be earning money if I had not been waiting to put a dollar value on my time, and show that this same doctor would charge patients who were late for appointments. I won $90 (a lot of money in the 60's).
My lesson: FIGHT BACK against this kind of treatment any way that you can. You can succeed!
Just remember those drug reps providing lunches are also providing free sample medications... to be given out to patients. Sure helps a lot of high co-pay, uninsured, or under-insured patients save some money. And it's not the drug reps making long waits, it's the patient that comes for a visit for one thing and has a list of many other things to be addressed.
An office nurse.
Our dental hygenist tells us the same thing happens in their dental office. She explained why she was giving her lunch order while she was cleaning my teeth.