ISFOUND - Patient Consultation Case

Group Code: ____________

Patients who wanted to seek consultation with doctors go through a series of steps and experiences every day. This document provides you with some
information about these steps and experiences patients go through to get a consultation.

Getting a Consultation​​Schedule
To get a consultation schedule, the patient go through several steps.

1. Find doctors on a specific specialty and get the contact information of the clinic.​
This is done through several ways:
​
● Asking friends for a referral and this includes receiving some information​1 about the doctor’s clinic
● Asking a doctor for a referral, this includes receiving some information about the doctor’s clinic
● Going to a hospital’s website and look for a doctor and the contact information of the clinic

​
Most established private hospitals have Doctor’s clinic information2 on their website. It will have information about what room the clinic is,
the day and time the doctor ‘s clinic is open for consultation in that clinic. The contact information of the clinic is available. This step of
finding doctor is repeated in any of the following cases:

● The preferred doctor’s clinic schedule may not match the patient’s availability
● Upon scheduling for a consultation, the number of patients that can be accommodated has been exceeded, and the next available
schedule is not acceptable to the patient
● Upon scheduling for a consultation, the doctor is away for a conference, vacation or other personal or professional matters, and the
next available schedule is not acceptable to the patient

2. Get in touch with the clinic to schedule a consultation​.

Getting a consultation schedule is done by contacting the clinic’s secretary and inquiring for available schedule. This is done through phone
or by visiting the clinic itself. Getting a consultation schedule means that you are listed in the patient’s list for the day. What time your
consultation will be, or how many patients are ahead of you, or what number are you in the queue of patients for the day is not given. If a
patient will be using his/her health insurance for the consultation, the patient needs to inquire if the doctor is a doctor of his/her insurance.
If not, patients may look for a different doctor, for some, they just decide not to use the insurance for the sake of getting a consultation
quick.

Getting an Insurance Charge Clearance

Some patients that have health insurance will need to seek for insurance charge clearance for their consultation. The insurance charge clearance is a
document that needs to be presented to the doctor’s clinic that indicates that the consultation will be paid by the health insurance. To get this
clearance, a patient will have to go to the hospital’s corporate center typically a day before the scheduled consultation. The issued clearance is only
good for the day of the consultation. When the patient goes to the corporate center, the patient needs to fill up forms indicating the information about
the consultation (doctor, consultation day and time, purpose of consultation, diagnosis if available), and queue in line, wait for their names to be
called to get accommodated by the corporate center

Going for a consultation

On the day of your consultation, since what patients only know is that they are listed for the day, patients will usually cancel all their appointment or
activities within the entire day to go for the consultation. Before the start of the doctor’s clinic schedule for the day, patient will already be outside of
the clinic’s waiting area. There are clinics where even if you are already scheduled a consultation for the day, you will still need to sign on a queue
list posted at the clinic’s door. As a patient, you will not know if the patients listed before you have a scheduled consultation or are what they call
“walk-in” patients.

1
​ ypically, only the hospital where the doctors is having a clinic. There are some referrals which will include the doctor’s clinic contact number
T
2
Doctors have clinic in other hospitals (that may even be in the same city or area) with a different schedule for consultations. Patients get to see this information only if
the patient knows that the doctor has a clinic in that hospital or have gone through the hospital’s website and found the doctor having a clinic there. Another possible
way where the information about the several clinics of the doctors could be known is when other patients refer the doctor and give the doctor’s prescription containing
the information about the other clinics.
ISFOUND - Patient Consultation Case
Group Code: ____________

What are the common pain points of patients?

1. Patients are in a situation in the corporate center that they cannot leave since they will not know when their names will be called, afraid that
when their name is called, they are not in the center and their slot is forfeited to another patient. Patients will usually have no choice but to wait
“patiently” in the waiting area. Corporate center will be packed with patients that are requesting an insurance charge clearance.
2. The doctor’s clinic cannot be contacted. This happens because the secretary is out, and you don’t know when the secretary will be back. It can
also be that the secretary is busy on the affairs of the clinic and answering calls is the least of the priority
3. At the time of the consultation, doctors will not start on time for some personal or professional reasons. Waiting time usually gets longer and no
information will be usually available when the consultations will start. This is agonizing for some patients (especially those that are alone by
themselves), they cannot leave to eat, afraid that the consultation may start when they are not around, and the slot is given to the next patient.
4. The queue is also dynamic. Patients that are PWDs and Senior Citizens get to be inserted to the queue without you knowing. You will only know
that you are bumped down the queue when you ask the clinic secretary how many patients are listed before you. Some patients do get mad about
getting bumped down without knowing because that extends their waiting time.
5. Since it is possible to book a consultation with the doctor’s other clinic because of schedule. It gets frustrating for patients that their records were
not prepared and brought to the other clinic, resulting in rescheduling of the consultation or even pushed down the queue waiting for the records
to be brought to the clinic.
6. It is normal for some patients with other consultations within the day and the situation becomes quite problematic with issues about delayed start
of clinic time and changes to the queue. Patients who are using their medical insurance who will not be able to go to another doctor’s
consultation will have to go through applying for another insurance charging clearance because an insurance charging clearance is only good for
the day of the consultation.