Pediatrics of Arlington P.L.C.

Reviews 5

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Ethan Shelton

Dr. Hesselman is lovely, we really like her as a physician, and she is the only reason weve stayed with this practice. The practice is poorly ran from an operations standpoint. After our daughters upcoming 1 year appointment, we will be moving to a new practice. We have visited the doctor about 10 times in the 1st year of our babys life, and all but a couple of times, we have had to wait anywhere from 30 minutes to 2 hours PAST OUR APPOINTMENT TIME, to see the doctor. (So 70-80% of the time, that is what you should expect). Whats worse, is that during this time, there is no communication. We are generally very passive people, we are understanding customers, and give people/businesses the benefit of the doubt, but there comes a point when things are unacceptable, and the waiting times past our APPOINTMENT are just that, unacceptable. On top of that, there are countless visitors that arrive well after weve arrived, that get called back before us. Again, we understand that in the beginning, this is OK, they may have the same appointment time or may be seeing a doctor that is not behind schedule. However, after 30, 45, 60 minutes... still seeing visitors called back before us, is unacceptable. It would be very simple to communicate to waiting visitors, that their doctor is behind, and be asked if they would like to see one of the other pediatricians, etc., but this supports my notion that the office operates poorly, nobody says anything to us, we eventually have to ask. In addition, on our sick visits, we do not make the appointment with a specific pediatrician, so there really is no excuse for our doctor being behind schedule. Weve been given excuses like "there is a lot of flu going around" or "were short on doctors," so, does that mean you just simply operate by overbooking timeslots? On our last visit, our appointment was at 3:30pm, my wife waited in the waiting room until 5:08pm ("because we are waiting for a room to open up" though she noticed a handful of open rooms on her way back), and then she waited in the room until 5:23pm, (when our baby was inconsolable), to leave the room and demand to see a doctor immediately because she had been waiting for almost 2 hours. Then doctor recommended, "Oh you should have brought her in around 5:30 on a Friday." Im sorry, what??? We made an APPOINTMENT for an open time slot, and took off work early. I need you to think about waiting around a doctors office with a healthy or sick baby, with other potentially sick visitors, for 30 to 120 minutes. Think about how that will affect things like diaper changes, feeding, breast feeding, pumping, napping, the childs mood, your mood, your work schedule, and more; it is flat out unprofessional and quite concerning for this to occur regularly. We can only hope that the acquiring and or transferring of our precious files, goes well, but we will of course be over cautious and delicate about this important process, because we anticipate a challenge.

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Lori Smith

Dr. Garrett literally told me that my childrens Lyme protocol was nuts - in front of my kids. My Lyme doctor is an Infectious Disease doctor only specializing in Lyme and is one of the best Lyme doctors on the East Coast, as if she knows so much more than my ID doctor? She continued to belittle and berate me in FRONT of my children. I stopped her and told her she could either choose to treat the issue I was in for or we were leaving. Another visit Dr. Kim jumped right at my jugular, in front of my kids once again, when we were in for a different medical issue, demanding to know how they were diagnosed with Lyme, did they look only at the titers, and on and on. I finally stopped her and told her she was out of line and her questions were appropriate for my ID doctor and Id be happy to sit on a 3 way call with them. Dr. Garrett told me that my daughters croupy sounding cough was because she was trying to get attention, since she and another doctor had no answer as to why it was happening. She also told me a year prior that my daughters feeling of needing to urinate was her way of getting attention, since there was nothing physically wrong with her. Her answer, when she has none, is that the kid is trying to get attention. I was also told by another doctor in that office that they knew of no disease that would cause a child to feel hot so often without having a fever. All of these unknowns to them were actually Lyme, Babesia, Bartonella and Erlychiosis - tick-borne diseases. 6 years passed of being told nothing was wrong with my kids as my 6 year old continued to get sicker and sicker and could barely make it to school 3 days a week. Their plan of nothing wouldve literally killed my kids - Lyme is fatal if untreated. If it doesnt fit into a specified box, you arent going to get treatment here. Dr. Pease, Lischwe and Goldman are great and they arent confined to a box. Dr. Hesselman seemed pretty green. She told me once that she had been seeing all of these strange presentations of strep, all of which she listed were familiar to me since we had lived through it. And, Dr. Lischwe explained to me years ago all of the normal kid symptoms of strep, of which Hesselman found atypical. She is nice and listens, but certainly didnt seem as knowledgeable about basic kid illnesses. If you have sick child that needs to be seen, you get the luck of the draw, you cant request a doctor you like unless you can wait a week. Beware, be careful, and dont stay here if you arent getting answers. Dont wait as long as I did.

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LA Armstrong

The office staff is very busy ---- if you can avoid calling in the mornings, particularly Monday mornings, you should. You may have to try repeatedly to get through--- the phone line can ring busy for extended periods of time, and there is no automatic rollover to voice mail. They will get back to you as soon as they can and with good advice/effort. Dr. Goldman is very good with the kids; do expect instruction on parenting best practices even after your children have been going there for years and seem to be turning out all right. Its just part of the service. :-)

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Chris Trahant

My wife and I have had nothing but great experiences with Pediatrics of Arlington. Primarily, we see Dr. Goldman, who is simply fantastic. He is great with our son, and spends the time with us to answer any and all questions. His "bed side" manner is out of this world, and it is clear that he has each of his patients best interests at heart.

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francine nguyen

Arlington va hospital is a wonderful place to be when you want to be in good hand and good care. Dr. Campbell and dr. Osion. Are such great dr. Also the nurses there too. I love then.

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