Office Policies

Appointments
Phone Calls/Medical Concerns
Contacting the Physician On-Call
Prescription Refills
New Patient Courtesy Visits
Referrals
Bringing in Additional Children
Newborn Care
Urgent Care Center Visits and Emergency Department Visits
Hospital Admissions
Privacy Policy–HIPPA (PDF)

Appointments

  • All appointments must be scheduled in advance.
  • You do not need to speak to a nurse in order to schedule an appointment.
  • The Springdale office can schedule appointments at Mason and vice versa.
  • Saturday and evening appointments are scheduled sequentially.
  • Check-up appointments can be scheduled 6 to 12 months in advance.
  • We have a 24-hour cancellation policy for all appointments and there is a charge for missed appointments.
  • We are a group practice, and we manage information in patient charts so that any provider will feel comfortable seeing any patient in our practice. You may choose either a doctor or a  nurse practitioner to be your child’s primary care provider. We hope that you’ll become comfortable with several of our providers. If you want to see a specific provider, please make that request when you call.

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Phone Calls/Medical Concerns

  • A parent may choose to leave a message regarding their child instead of making an appointment.  Our medical staff is responsible for returning these phone calls. They are an excellent resource to help you decide if you need to bring your child in to the office or if there are steps you can take at home. Dependent on the urgency of the phone call it may take up to 24 hours to return your phone call.
  • You are free to leave a message for a physician, however please recognize that these calls are usually returned after the physicians are finished seeing patients. Depending on the physician’s schedule that may mean later in the evening or the following day.

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Prescription Refills

  • Please call for refills between 8:30 am and 4:30 pm during the week. Refill requests are not routinely handled during evening hours or on Saturdays.
  • We require 7 days notice for refills on stimulant medications for the treatment of ADD/ADHD and for psychiatric medications for the treatment of depression, anxiety or other psychiatric issues. The original prescribing physician must sign for these medications and one week allows sufficient time for that to occur.

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New Patient Courtesy Visits

Are you new to the area or looking for a new pediatrician? We would be happy to schedule a 30-minute courtesy visit. This will give you an opportunity to get to know us and see if our doctors are a good fit for you and your child. Please call either of our locations to schedule your appointment.

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Referrals

  • We refer patients to sub-specialists in the community and at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital.
  • We need to see patients before making a referral.
  • Referrals cannot be backdated.

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Bringing in Additional Children

  • We do not routinely see extra children who do not have appointments. This interferes with our scheduled patients and delays the physician.

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Newborn Care

  • We do not see newborns in the hospital. Newborns are seen by the Neonatology service while they are in the hospital with the mother.
  • We need to see newborn babies in our office at 4 to 6 days old. When you are leaving the hospital, please call our office to schedule this initial appointment.

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Urgent Care Center Visits and Emergency Department Visits

  • Children’s Hospital has emergency departments at its Burnet Campus and Liberty Township location, as well as urgent care centers in many locations around the city. Get directions and phone numbers here.
  • Please contact our office or the physician on-call so that we may guide you on whether you should take your child to an urgent care or emergency department, given the medical circumstances.

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Hospital Admissions

  • Hospitals now have their own Providers who handle admitting patients. The Hospitalist Providers will communicate with our practice to share information which will help with the best possible outcome for your child. We typically ask our families to use CCHMC because of this relationship and agreement our practice has with the hospital.

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