Appointments
We must work by appointment to be efficient. However patients do not become ill on schedule, hospital work may take longer than anticipated, and emergencies do occur. Hence, a delay in our schedule may occur. A sincere attempt is made by us to adhere to the appointment schedule.
If you cannot keep an appointment please give us reasonable notice. We will ask families to seek care elsewhere if they fail to appear for appointments.
Please do not ask that other members of your family be worked in at the time of your scheduled appointment. If a situation arises where immediate examination and treatment is necessary your child will be worked in as quickly as possible.
To insure continuous and adequate pediatric services to our patients the following policies are in effect:
New Patient
Patients who have not previously been seen, but who wish to establish continued care at this office, will gladly be seen. A complete physical examination is desirable on the first visit or soon thereafter. Because of the seasonal variation in requests for appointments the office may not be able to schedule new patients on the day requested. This will prevent excessive waiting for our regular patients.
Established Patient
Patients are seen by appointment only. Patients who arrive without an appointment will be seen only after all patients with appointments are seen. True emergencies are an obvious exception to this rule. We do not encourage walk-ins.
Emergencies
In case of emergencies you may call at any time. During office hours, if you are asked to hold, please say, "NO, this is an emergency". Your call will then be handled immediately. After hours our phone lines are answered by our answering service or by nurses of the Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta (CHOA) telephone advice line. Your call should be returned within approximately one hour.
For truly urgent calls or for calls sent back to the on-call doctor by CHOA, the physician on call will be paged promptly on his/her pager and your call will be returned as soon as possible. Some situations (accidents, severe cuts, or life threatening illness) require immediate attention. If this is true for you, take your child directly to the Wellstar Cobb Hospital Emergency Department or nearest hospital emergency department.
Consultation Policy
The practice is limited to pediatrics and adolescent medicine. This covers a broad range of medical problems and a few minor surgical problems. If your child's illness requires a surgeon or a medical sub-specialist, then we will refer your child to an appropriate specialist.
Periodic Comprehensive Examinations
Comprehensive child care includes prevention of sickness and discussion and evaluation of behavioral and developmental problems. In order to do this, we should see your child for periodic well checkups. This is done to detect minor problems before they become major problems. Prevention and early detection of illness is the best and most economical approach to good health.
