RB
Reid Bengard
Dec 13, 2024
I'm sharing the experience I had when I brought my dad in for a TAVR, which is a common minimally invasive valve replacement procedure. The nurse support was great -- highly responsive and knowledgeable and kept my review above 1 star. On the day of the procedure, we showed up as instructed before noon for an afternoon appointment. We waited for over 2 hours before someone saw us, which I came to understand is pretty standard. They want you there early in case there's a cancelation of a prior procedure so the doctors don't need to wait. OK.
On this day, we actually waited over 7 hours before they finally canceled and asked us to reschedule. It seems they had other procedures that kept demanding the surgical room we were to use, so we kept getting bumped. The system is very geared to physician/hospital convenience, and perhaps that's a function of supply and demand, but it's hard on patients (when they finally canceled, my 83 year old dad had been fasting for almost 24 hours).
My advice is to schedule the first appointment of the day -- they have you get there at an insane hour (well before you really need to be there in case you get lost on the way, I guess), but it's better than taking your chances with a later appointment. I'm going to try taking my dad to another hospital and just hope that they do more for patient convenience.