Saratoga Community Health Center

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Reviews

• Kadi D

  Oct, 17 2018
  ★ ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆
  I had 2 herniated discs, I went to the urgent care for pain meds, they gave me one pill to cover me till the next morning & told me see my GP. I called them at 8am (it was a friday) explained EXACTLY why I needed an appointment ie severe pain & I was directed to get meds from my primary by the urgent care MD, I also told them that I had an ortho appointment scheduled for late the next week & just needed help with the pain until then. I got an appointment later that day & by the time I got there I was in so much pain I was throwing up.
  
  I saw the NP, I told her why I was there & she flat out refused to give me any pain meds, I started to cry because I hadn't slept in days, I was in severe pain & the person who can help me is treating me like a drug addict!
  
  Now let me say, I have NEVER once abused any drugs & to prove this to her I actually called my sister who is also a healthcare professional, I asked her to explain the situation to the NP & I also reminded her that she could easily look me up in the state wide database to confirm that I haven’t even been prescribed a narcotic drug in more than 5 years but she made up her mind and flat out refused to help me.
  
  To add insult to injury she told me she was concerned about the amount of pain I was in & she wanted to send me to the ER to have it evaluated right away. At that point I literally had no other options choice. The most messed up part of all of it was that when she sent me to the ER, SHE SENT ME FOR A PSYCH EVAL!
  
  I was so angry, not only had she refused to provide treatment but she further delegitimize the seriousness of the situation by suggesting it was a psych issue! Needless to say, I wasn't having it, I had to call the hospital advocate, I explained what was happening & the woman totally agreed that what was happening was unacceptable.
  
  she immediately had me seen by another dr. who did in fact give me meds and then sent me on my way. Because of how traumatized I was by this experience I knew I would never go back to the clinic so I reached out to a friend from Albany Med (yes, I'm also a health care professional), told him what happened & because he knew me well enough to know I was in serious pain he got me connected with the chief of surgery (bone & joint) who saw me at 8am the following monday.
  
  From there Dr. Uhl & Dr. Kehlsa sent me for an MRI which in-fact confirmed that I had managed to herniate both my C5 & C6 vertebra & also had a impinged nerve. Once they saw it, they said they were not at all surprised by the amount of pain I was in as the injury was known to be serious.
  
  I left the Bone & Joint clinic with pain meds & a script for PT which I have been doing for 4 weeks now. The pain has since subsided but the anger has not. What this NP did was straight up malpractice & I will be reporting this incident to the board because more than refusing me care & humiliating me by sending me for a psych eval she also cost me hundreds of dollars between copays (for her & the hospital) and ambulance fees.
  
  So here's the deal, as I said I'm a health care professional, I understand the crackdown on opioids but providers who refuse to script to a legitimate patient in need are putting their interests ahead of the patients & that's absolutely unacceptable. If a provider is uncomfortable with their ability to sort out legitimate patients from drug seekers they should NOT be seeing patients PERIOD, it's a violation of the hippocratic oath.
  
  That's my take on this place, outside of this traumatizing experience I never really felt comfortable there, the staff are not friendly & making you wait an hour (after you're scheduled) doesn't seem to be an issue for them either.
  
  The last thing I would say that I had an established relationship with a provider there, these people knew me from other visits, I've never had an issue but on this particular day, my provider wasn't there & I ended up with the NP from hell. So don't assume that having an established relationship at the clinic will reduce the potential for such an awful experience.
  
  Just go elsewhere!

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