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How to find "good" doctors?

Avengers26

Senior Member
Messages
158
How do you guys go about finding "good" doctors? eg. a "good" dermatologist/ cardiologist etc. etc. I mean intelligent, intuitive & thorough doctors. Bedside manners would be nice but wouldn't be a deal breaker for me. Word of mouth? Is Angie's List reliable? Castle Connolly? RateMD's? Anything else?

My experience with Rate MD's hasn't been great. Lot of those reviews seem fake to me & my experience on using doctors based on that site hasn't been anything to write home about.

P.S. I hope I am posting this in the right forum. I didn't want to post this in the ME/CFS doctors section because this is not about them.
 

minkeygirl

But I Look So Good.
Messages
4,678
Location
Left Coast
I go to google, put in the doc's name and reviews and you get a lot of hits from a lot of medical review sites. I also use Yelp. I'm not sure about Angie's list for a doctor.

I got referred to an Infectious Disease doc. One Yelp review said she was horrible and other medical review sites also gave her marginal ratings, yet my PCP's office said they had patients who really liked her. I just didn't want to see her. But it's hard to figure out. Sometimes you just have to go and deal with it.

One thing I used to do was call and talk to the office manager. If they were bitchy there's a good chance the doc isn't so great either.
 

JaimeS

Senior Member
Messages
3,408
Location
Silicon Valley, CA
One thing I used to do was call and talk to the office manager. If they were bitchy there's a good chance the doc isn't so great either.

Funny you should mention that - that's the only way I've been able to find anyone even remotely helpful. Call the front desk and say, "can you tell me a little bit about the doctor? Would you say they are intellectually curious and kind?" That seems to do it. You can tell from the receptionist's voice just how true that is or isn't.

-J
 

JAH

Senior Member
Messages
497
Location
Northern California
I actually used Yelp once.
Can you get a referral from a doc that you like? That plus word of mouth the best result. Worst doc I saw should have trusted my intuition when the office manager hesitated when I asked I if she would recommend her.

Good luck, it's tough...J