Updated January 2018
Office Practice Policies
Coronation Family Physicians
1. SAME DAY AND EVENING SERVICES - As a patient of the Cambridge Coronation FHO, you are expected to NOT attend any outside walk-in clinics. Patients who attend outside walk-in clinics will be derostered from the practice. As such, the Cambridge Coronation FHO offers urgent same day appointments every weekday including after-hours services to cover all of your urgent health care needs. If you have an urgent health problem during regular weekday office hours, please call our office and we will do our best to find you an urgent appointment that day. If you have an urgent health problem outside of regular offices hours, please call THAS (Telephone Health Advisor Service) 1-866-553-7205. Our after-hours services are scheduled as follows: Monday to Thursday 5 to 8 p.m.
2. CANCELLATION OF APPOINTMENTS - If you need to cancel your appointment, please call the office at least 24 hours in advance. Appointments which are cancelled WITHOUT 24 HOURS notification or appointments missed without notice will be charged a fee to you.
3. LATE ARRIVAL FOR APPOINTMENTS - We will do everything we can to ensure the office runs efficiently and stays on schedule as much as possible. You can help us by arriving on time for your appointment. If you arrive more than 10 minutes late for your appointment your appointment will be consider "missed" and you will be asked to reschedule for another time.
4. WAITING IN THE OFFICE - Your physician may need to deal with unexpected emergencies or may require more time with a patient than initially expected. This may result in the physician running behind schedule on certain days. We appreciate your patience in these situations. In order to reduce waiting time, patients can help remedy this situation by indicating to the receptionist exactly what medical problem will be dealt with at that appointment. This will allow us to better set an appropriate length of appointment time.
5. MEDICATIONS AND PRESCRIPTION REFILLS - Please call your pharmacy and request that they fax the office (office fax number is 1-855-530-6121) what medications you need. Please allow up to two weeks for the refill prescription to be processed by the office. Do not allow your medications to run out. Do not wait at the pharmacy for us to repeat the medications immediately. Please note that your doctor may need to see you before prescribing the medication. We ask that you please bring all medications to every appointment for your physician to review.
6. MEDICAL ADVICE BY PHONE - In rare circumstances, your doctor may offer you medical advice by phone. Please do not call the office asking to speak to your physician, if it is required or urgent, your physician will call you to discuss medical matters, but please understand that your physician is usually busy seeing patients during the day, so any phone calls must adhere to your doctor's schedule. Please note that medical advice by phone is a service NOT covered by OHIP, so be aware that a fee starting at $25.00 may be assessed.
7. RESULTS OF TESTS - Any test results (I.e. lab work, X-rays, etc) are not given over the phone, unless in exceptional circumstances, receptionists do not give results over the phone. Follow up appointments should be made to review and discuss any investigations with your doctor.
8. SCHEDULED APPOINTMENTS - Regular appointments are scheduled for 10 minutes and physicals for 20-30 minutes. Given the time for regular appointments, it is best to bring only one or two concerns per visit. This ensures that the physician can appropriately deal with the concerns in a safe and comprehensive manner. Any other important concerns that you may have should be dealt with at separate appointments. If you have made an appointment for yourself, it is for you and not anyone else. Please call ahead if you would like a family member to be seen, (i.e. children) on that day and we will try to accommodate you. It is best to try and book separate appointments for you, your children, and any other family members. Again, this is done to ensure Individual concerns can be properly and safely addressed.
9. PHYSICAL EXAMS - (OR PERIODIC HEALTH EXAM) - We recommend adult physicals be done every 18 months to 2 years. Physical exams do not need to be done annually. The adult physical appointment already covers a wide range of health and screening topics, and therefore any separate issues or additional concerns that arise at the physical will need to be dealt with at a separate appointment. Do not save up a list of your concerns to be addressed at your physical, because your doctor will not have time at that appointment to address them.
10. FORMS - All forms must be discussed with the physicians prior to being completed. Do NOT drop off any forms at the office for your doctor to complete - you must make an appointment to review your forms with your doctor. The completion of many government and Insurance forms are considered uninsured services (l.e. these services are not covered by OHIP), and you wilt be billed an appropriate fee for form completion (approximately $30 per page). Please ensure you discuss this fee with your doctor. Many forms may take up to four weeks for completion; certain letters depending on their complexity may take longer.
11. PASSPORTS - We suggest that you contact another official (i.e. dentist, lawyer, bank manager, engineer, clergyman) to sign these due to the limited time the physicians have in their busy schedules. If you still wish the physician to sign these, please remember they will need to have known you for at least two years. Please allow a minimum of 6 weeks.
12. UNINSURED SERVICES - OHIP does not pay for all the services that you may request from your family doctor, such as insurance form completion and Ministry of Transportation physicals. As a result, it is necessary for our office to charge fees for these uninsured services. A list of uninsured services In Ontario is available at the office, along with our fees for these services. Our fees for uninsured services are based on the provincial guidelines established by the Ontario Medical Association.
13. HARASSMENT - There will be zero tolerance for any form of harassment and/or abusive behavior towards front desk staff, nurses, and physicians at the offices of Coronation Family
Physicians. This includes verbal, physical, and sexual harassment and any inappropriate or abusive communications via email or telephone. Any such harassment and/or abusive behavior
will be grounds for immediate derostering and discharging of the patient from the medical practice.
14. PARKING - There is a flat fee of $2.00 for parking.
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