Patient Information

How to make an appointment

Appointments may be made by calling the appointment desk of our various offices from 9:00AM to 5:00PM, Monday through Friday. Appointments for visits or various tests are available from 7:30AM to 4:30PM based on availability. If you need to reschedule, we kindly request a 24-hour notice as a courtesy to other patients. For particular tests we request a verbal confirmation within 24 hours prior to the test.

Before your visit

In preparation for your visit, be sure to bring the following:

• Insurance or Medicare cards
• Required referral or authorization
• ALL your medication bottles (or a list of medicine names, dosages, and directions for all prescribed or over the counter medicines)
• Previous medical records
• Recent test results or hospital records
• New patients should arrive 15 – 30 minutes before their scheduled appointment time to complete required paperwork. If you are going to be late for an appointment, please call as soon as possible. Patients who are late will be seen only at the discretion of the provider.

Waiting Time

The staff and the physicians of the Heart Medical Group very much respect the time of our patients. We strive to minimize waiting time. However, it is in the nature of the field of cardiology, that urgent office appointments have to be made despite the schedule being full. Urgent office appointments or emergent visits in the hospital have to be prioritized and may cause delay in waiting time. Due to emergent procedures in the hospital it is rarely required that office appointments have to be cancelled on short notice. We ask for your understanding and will try to accommodate your needs as best as we can. While in the office you may notice that a patient who entered the office after you may be called upon by the staff before you. This may be the result of this patient coming to the office for a different reason than yourself and as such being subject to a different schedule. Patients visit our offices for multiple reasons including a visit with the physician or various tests or therapies conducted in our offices. We ask our diabetic patients to bring some food or fluids to the office, so that you feel comfortable during your time in the office.

Patient Portal

Our patients will have access to our Patient Portal, a HIPAA compliant web-based system that serves as a secure communication link between you and your physician. When you log in to our Patient Portal with your private user name and password, you can see information directly from your electronic medical record at our office.

After logging in to our Patient Portal, you can:

1. Use the messaging feature to communicate with clinic staff of physicians.
2. View your health summary information.
3. Send health summary information update requests if you notice missing information.
4. Add an appointment request.
5. Request a referral or a medication refill.

Medication Refills

Good medical practice (as well as state law) dictates that patients be re-evaluated on a periodic basis prior to prescribing or refilling medications. You may be asked to schedule a follow up visit when you request a refill. If this is the case, we will make every effort within reason to assure that your medication regimen is not interrupted or that your health is not put at risk, however you must keep your follow up appointment. Please allow up to 72 hours for a refill to be processed. If your pharmacy told you in case of a delay that a refill request was faxed, please confirm with our office staff whether a refill request was in fact received.

Financial policy

The responsibility of payment for medical services lies with the patient alone. We are happy to assist you within reason with your insurance claims. However, we are not responsible for insurance companies' denials of claims for services rendered or recommended, or of requests for referrals. Payment is due at the time services are rendered. If you would like to discuss your options for payment, please contact our billing department.

In Case of Emergency

Call 911 or go immediately to the closest emergency room. The hospital will contact our physician on call. However, non-emergent but urgent appointments please contact our office. Our physicians are available during office hours, as well as on-call when the office is closed.

Phone calls

To best manage the high traffic calls received each day, our office utilizes a voicemail system to receive phone calls. We ask that you listen carefully to the message, and then leave your name, a phone number you can be reached at, and a brief message. All calls are returned as soon as possible. If you do not receive a returned call within 24 hours, please call again. Given the high volume of phone calls we encourage you to use the Patient Portal.

Talking to the Physician

We encourage you to sign up with our Patient Portal which is free to our patients and allows for easy communication with the office and the physicians. However, if you need to talk to your physician please let the operator know who will then contact the physician. Your Physician will communicate with you in case test results are abnormal or further testing is needed. The physicians will not call routinely for normal test results.