The doctor will see you, eventually

Several decades ago, when I was a child, I remember being dragged to the ‘doctor shop’ at a moment’s notice by my mom. We would meet with an elderly gentleman sitting alone on a chair, with a stethoscope around his neck, reading a magazine. My mom would bombard him with a litany of my symptoms, some real and many imaginary. The doctor would dutifully apply the end of the stethoscope to various parts of my body and write out a prescription on a piece of paper. The visit would conclude with an exchange of some small change between my mom and the ‘doctor uncle’. 

In the current digital world, visiting a healthcare professional, aka a doctor, is nothing short of a major project. You cannot just walk in — an appointment must be booked, typically online using the patient portal, optionally by going through several tutorial videos for the technology-challenged.

A barrage of text and email messages follow, providing you with a mixture of instructions and prerequisites for the visit. The instructions range from how to drive to the doctor’s location and how to park, all the way down to which elevator to take and which doors to open to enter the building.

The prerequisites consist of completing multiple questionnaires asking if anyone within a hundred miles of your home has had Covid symptoms in the past week, a health proxy form for someone to make medical decisions on your behalf if you become incapacitated, a list of all the medications and allergies from the age of three and several trick questions to assess if you are mentally depressed. You also must prove that you have valid medical insurance by uploading images of your insurance card, putting to test your smartphone camera skills. 

Then you start getting daily ‘alerts’ asking you to confirm that you would be alive to be present for the appointment. You run the risk of cancellation should you choose to ignore these alerts.

On D-day, you arrive at the doctor’s office a good half hour before the appointment, as instructed, if I may add, to take care of any remaining formalities. At the check-in desk, the doctor’s assistant asks you all the questions that you had painstakingly answered online several days ago. Any attempt to point this out is met with a nonchalant wave of the hand and the response, “that is a different system”.

Holding on to your dear life, you finally enter the doctor’s chambers. You notice that the doctor, while trying to talk to you about your illness, is as busy as you were, trying to fill his own set of forms! You feel a sense of pity and comradery for a fellow sufferer!

As you exit the scene with a sense of relief, not from your clean chit of health from the doctor, but from the release from non-medical procedures, you hear a buzz on your phone – a customer satisfaction survey regarding your recent visit has arrived!