Can you figure out which hospital this is?
By adamg - Wed, 10/24/2007 - 10:00am.
All sorts of problems getting to an appointment - it isn't Beth Israel Deaconness, whose CEO posted the complaint about Brand X.
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Aha!!
Brigham and Women's, maybe?
I still recall last January when I had to go to Brigham & Womens for a hand biopsy. Since it was an extremely icy-cold day, I'd decided to drive, rather than take the T. Not only was the traffic horrendous, but in order to get to the hospital, I had to make a very risky left turn, which involved crossing the MBTA tracks to get to the hospital and the parking garage, which can also be tough to find a parking space in.
Only so much is within their control
The complaint on Paul Levy's blog was about a hospital having crazy traffic on their property, it sounded like (I'm guessing MGH, btw). The area you're describing near the green line tracks near either Brigham Circle or the Longwood stop (not sure which route you took exactly) isn't on B&W property, so there isn't a whole lot they can do about it. I live a few blocks from there, and sure, there are traffic jams, but it's mostly traffic passing through the area, not traffic entering/leaving B&W property that they'd be able to reroute in any way.
Also, how's the left turn across the tracks risky? (Nevermind that it sounds like you're asking B&W to relocate the tracks and/or their hospital). If you're talking about the portion of the E line with raised crossings and platforms, there are left-turn arrows and T signals. If you crossed the tracks further down where they're not on a right-of-way, the trains move with the flow of traffic, so navigating around them is no different than making a left in front of an oncoming car (except that you have the added bonus of knowing the train isn't going to swerve into another lane). But really, isn't it up to you to take a different route to the hospital if you don't like crossing over train tracks? Rather than blame them for locating their hospital convenient to transportation?
I've personally had the shortest wait times and best communication from staff at B&W, but it could depend on the department and whatnot. MGH has been the next best in my experience, followed not too far behind by BMC and NEMC. BI has been horrible, largely because even if there's a reasonable justification for delays, the staff refuse to give any information about what's going on and are generally condescending, particularly when the patient is someone with a psych/cognitive disability. Delays are much easier to deal with at the other hospitals where the staff overall have better people skills.
Note: This isn't based on a scientific sample, but just on my personal experiences of going to a lot of hospitals for my own appointments and having taken a lot of clients to them.
My opions are also based on personal experience.
I believe that the solution to dealing with the left-hand turn in the vicinity of Brigham Circle that involves crossing the MBTA tracks is to implement a "left turn on left arrow only" signal. That, I believe, would go a long way towards reducing the number of accidents that they're probably are at such intersections as that, in that drivers won't be tempted to play "chicken" with the oncoming MTA train. Fortunately, there was no oncoming MBTA train at the time I had to make that left turn, but, nonetheless, having to make a left turn at that kind of intersection sort of creeps me out, nonetheless. I'm a very conservative driver who never, ever takes that kind of risk, but I support the "left turn on left arrow only" idea, nonetheless.
Regarding my other experiences at Brigham and Womens, while I miraculously got there on time to register and check in, the hand surgeon was running more than half an hour late, and I was not notified about that. After the biopsy was done, I was told to follow up by giving them a call to let them know how things were going. I called a week later to tell them that the biopsy area was an angry red with a whitish center, and felt quite warm to the touch. I was then told that neither the hand surgeon or the physician's assistant would be in until Monday. I decided that I'd wait until Monday.
Unfortunately, late that Saturday night, the infected area opened up and began exudingt a yellowish-green matter, which sent me scurrying to the Brigham and Womens ER late that icy-cold January night. I waited about an hour to be seen, and luckily the people on call that night were competent and sympathetic, but one never knows who or what they'll have to deal with in a hospital ER.
So, after that, I resolved to avoid hospitals as much as possible.
Surprised It's Not BI
When I use to go to the Orthopedics at Beth Israel I always waited an hour to see my doctor. 9am appointment meant I could see me doctor at 10am if I was lucky.
You are right, Guitarguy . . .
. . . we did have a big problem with delays in orthopaedics, but have fixed those, so that waiting times are much, much shorter now and appointments are much more likely to be on time. Check out this link for the story: http://runningahospital.blogspot.com/2007/03/lean-machine.html.
That being said, I hope you don't need that particular service line again, particularly given your interest in playing a musical instrument.
The point of my post was to say that we actually monitor the performance of our clinics and try to make improvements.