Clinic Information and Policies
Our physician team at Perth Medical Clinic is part of a Family Health Organization, FHO. A FHO is a group of family physicians who are working together to give you and your family better access to quality primary services. The physicians at this clinic are committed to supporting each other’s patients throughout the day, week and year when your primary care doctor is not available for any reason.
Appointment Information
Clinic hours are from Monday to Thursday from 9:00am to Noon and 1-4pm, and Friday 9:00am to Noon. The clinic offers same day appointments (subject to availability) for urgent medical issues. In order to reserve one of these spots, you will need to call the office to book an appointment. Preferably your appointment will always be booked with your family physician, however if he/she is unavailable, every attempt will be made to have another physician see you.
Please arrive at least 10 minutes before your scheduled appointment time. This allows time for check in and evaluation from the nurse, including vitals, weight, urine tests, etc. In order to allow the clinic to function on time, and to respect the other patients, your physician may be unable to see you if you arrive late.
Please note: If your health card is found to be expired or invalid for any reason at your appointment, the clinic reserves the right to ask for a deposit or payment for this appointment. This payment will be reimbursed with presentation of a valid health card.
Missed Appointments Policy
Missed appointments deny other patients access to medical care. If you do not show up for an appointment, you will be charged a fee between $35.00 and $70.00 depending on your visit type. If you are unable to attend your appointment for any reason, please call the office a minimum of 24 hours in advance to cancel. If adequate cancellation notice is not provided, you will be subject to the missed appointment fee. Multiple missed appointments without adequate reason could be grounds for dismissal from the practice.
Patients who arrive late may not be seen or may need to wait until the patients who arrived on time have been seen. These may also be classified as “missed” appointments and therefore subject to the missed appointment fee.
Staff do not automatically cancel an existing appointment on your behalf unless instructed by you to do so. If you book another appointment or if your medical issue is dealt with in another manner, it is your responsibility to ensure any outstanding/future appointments are cancelled, in order to avoid a missed appointment fee.
As a general rule, we do not call to remind patients of their upcoming appointments. Patients are responsible to ensure they keep track of their appointment information.
Abuse Policy
Perth Medical Clinic believes every staff member and physician has the right to work in a safe workplace environment.
We also believe every patient and visitor to our clinic has the right to receive care in a safe environment.
This office has zero tolerance for abusive or disrespectful behavior towards our staff, our colleagues, fellow patients, or visitors. Abusive behavior includes, swearing, threatening language or aggressive actions of any kind, in person or by phone.
Patients exhibiting the above behavior will be asked to leave the clinic immediately. Any instance of abuse, physical or verbal, may result in immediate dismissal from the practice and termination of the patient-physician relationship.
Narcotics/Special Medications Policy
Given the risk of abuse of these medications, in general, we greatly restrict prescribing them. If you are on these medications and we agree to prescribe them for you, you will be required to sign a Narcotic Contract, be subject to random urine drug screening and the medications will be dispensed in small batches for easy monitoring. All renewals of controlled substances will be done by appointment ONLY (requests will not be renewed by fax and any requests from the pharmacy will be refused). Any breach to the Narcotics Contract could result in dismissal from the practice and will result in discontinuation of further prescription renewals.
You may discuss prescription of medical marijuana individually with your family physician.
Medication Renewals Policy
It is your responsibility to book appointments to renew your medications before they run out. As doctor’s schedules can fill up quickly, please ensure you are calling to book your appointment 4-6 weeks before you will need to be seen. It is important that you are seen for medication renewals, as your medical condition needs to be reassessed and side effects discussed, which impact on the renewal. Renewal requests done by fax or phone will result in a temporary renewal for a small amount until you make an appointment, which is usually a 1-month supply, and will be subject to a fee.
Forms Policy
Completion of forms is considered an Uninsured Service and is not covered by OHIP. Refer to the list of fees for Uninsured Services (available at reception), as recommended by the OMA guidelines. Although all attempts will be made to complete forms in a timely manner, as per the OMA and CPSO guidelines, physicians have up to 60 days to complete forms.
Unvaccinated Patients Policy
If you choose not to vaccinate yourself or your children and there is an outbreak of a vaccine-preventable disease, you may be asked to only visit the clinic at certain times in order to not come in contact with others at risk of infection from these diseases (babies, cancer patients, patients with immunodeficiency disorders).
Internal Transfers
We do not routinely allow patients to directly transfer to another doctor working at the clinic. If you would like to switch doctors, you can choose to leave your current doctor and have your name put on our clinic waitlist. The doctors support each other’s patients throughout the day, week and year when the primary care doctor is not available for any reason. You may see another doctor for emergency/urgent care if your doctor is not available. You should take into consideration that although you may leave one doctor in the group for another – your original doctor may still be involved in providing your health care and you may still have to interact with them. Because of this, as a general rule, we would recommend that you consider finding another doctor outside of Perth Medical Clinic if you are unhappy with your doctor.
Medical Learners
Doctors in our clinic routinely take part in teaching medical students and resident doctors. As a patient in this clinic, you may be seen and cared for by a medical learner in conjunction with your family doctor. Research shows that patients receive better care when medical learners are involved in their care. We hope that you will be agreeable to be seen by a medical learner from time to time, although you may politely decline.
Our clinic is open and welcoming of all genders, ages, ethnicities and sexual orientations. We hope you feel that this is an open and nonjudgmental place where you can be yourself.
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