Pediatric Consultants offers a wide range of services in order to
provide comprehensive care for your child from birth to young adulthood:

Newborn Visits
Our doctors visit the hospital nursery each morning. The babies are examined carefully to make sure there are no health problems. The doctor will also visit the new mother to answer any questions. We will see new babies at Baptist Hospital East, Methodist Germantown, and Methodist Central.

Office Visits
Almost all of your encounters with our physician staff will be in our offices. We will help you keep your child healthy with regularly scheduled examinations. During these visits your doctor will discuss with you all types of child care issues: immunizations, nutrition, safety.

Hospital Visits
In the event your child has a sickness or injury that requires hospitalization, the pediatricians in our group are experts in the care of sick children. We routinely prefer to hospitalize at LeBonheur Childrens Medical Center, but we also see patients at Baptist East Hospital. The staff physicians in our group will oversee the child's care and arrange for any sub specialty visits that may be necessary.

The physicians in our group are also available to provide office or hospital consultation to local and regional physicians. Physician referrals can be seen on a same day or next day basis if necessary.

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Appointments

Appointments, whether for a well child or a sick child, no longer require two different appointment types. You can call the day you need an appointment and we will be able to schedule your child on that day or the next. We understand many of you have a busy work schedule. If you need to ensure time off from work, make transportation arrangements, etc, you may continue to call weeks in advance to schedule an appointment for a well-child check. But calling weeks to months in advance is no longer necessary for you to see your chinos primary pediatrician.

When scheduling an appointment, let the scheduler know of any special problems that you would like to address during the appointment. Developmental problems, school issues, and behavioral problems require more time than a routine physical exam.

Recommended Childhood Immunization Schedule

The recommended schedule for check ups during the first 2-years of life is mainly to keep the required immunizations up-to-date. The schedule of immunizations as recommended by the American Academy of Pediatrics is shown below.

Recommended Childhood and Adolescent Immunization Schedule - United States, January - June 2004

Telephone Calls

Emergency Calls (day or night)
Call 911 for life threatening emergencies in which your child may require resuscitation (your child is not breathing, is choking severely, is unconscious, or is having seizures, for example).

Call our office for minor emergencies such as dehydration, difficulty breathing, minor lacerations, and minor fractures. When you call in, always state clearly, "This is an emergency." Your call will be transferred immediately to a nurse or physician.

For poisonings call the Southern Poison Control Center at 901.528.6048.

Calls about sick children during office hours
If your child is sick and you want the doctor to see him/her, call our office for an appointment. If your child is sick and you would like advice on how to care for your child at home, our telephone triage nurses can help. The nurses are trained to make decisions about patients that need to be seen by the doctor and how to provide home care for children that may not need to see the doctor. You may be asked to leave a message and a nurse will return your call.

Calls about well-child questions
We are happy to provide you with the health information you need as a parent. (See Recommended Reading). Please place calls about behavior questions or other well-child issues during weekday office hours.

Please have the following information available when you call:

• Your child's main symptoms
• Any chronic disease or health problem your child has
• Your child's temperature if she is sick
• Your child's approximate weight (for calculating drug dosages)
• The names of any medications your child is taking
• Your pharmacy's phone number
• Your questions (it's a good idea to write them down)

Prescriptions

Many children with chronic illness require daily, long-term medication. Our office is happy to call in refills for these medications during weekday office hours. Remember to have the have the prescription number and the telephone number of your pharmacy when you call.

We prefer not to call in antibiotic prescriptions without an office visit.

Remember that your child's stimulant medication (Ritalin, Adderall) cannot be called in by phone.

Make sure you call before you run out of medication.

Referrals to Specialists

Pediatric Consultants, P.C. is a group of generalists who provide Primary Care. Most insurance plans now have a specified provider list of specialists and the primary care provider has a 'gatekeeper' responsibility.

If your insurance plan requires our office to fill out referral paperwork, please let us know at least one week before your appointment. It is nearly impossible to get these done on a same day basis. Even when our staff can devote their full attention to this task, the insurers often take hours to do their part.

After-hours visits to the Emergency Department and Urgent Care Centers also sometimes require our approval within 48 hours. We cannot retroactively approve these visits once the time has elapsed.

The number of different insurance plans makes it impossible for us to keep up with your individual plan requirements. It is your responsibility to keep us informed of your plan's requirements and to allow us time to properly complete the necessary forms. Any time you need to seek care outside our office, please check your insurance plan's handbook and provider list.

Our Laboratory

Our office laboratory is able to perform the following tests at either office location:

• Complete Blood Count (CBC) Urinalysis (UA) without microscopy Rapid Strep Screen
• Urine pregnancy test

We have fulfilled the requirements to have CLIA Certification to perform these tests (East Location CLIA #: 44D0920583, Medical Center Location CLIA #: 44D0718169). Our lab procedures are carefully documented and overseen by a licensed medical technologist.

Other more sophisticated tests such as serum chemistries or cultures will require sending your child to a hospital or referral laboratory. Your insurance plan may require you to go to a specific outside referral lab (Smith-Kline, Memphis Path, etc.)

Billing and Insurance

Our Billing Office will file your insurance claims. Many insurance plans require that we collect a co-pay at the time of your office visit. Other insurance plans pay a set percentage of the charges. It is important that we have up-to-date insurance information on your family's health plan. Please be sure to inform the office staff of any changes to your insurance as soon as they occur. If your insurance plan does not pay all of your charges, the balance will be your responsibility. Statements are mailed monthly, and payment is expected in a timely manner. If you ever have questions or problems with your statement or your payment, a member of our billing staff will be happy to discuss them with you.

Payments can be mailed to :
Pediatric Consultants, P.C.
P.O. Box 1979
Memphis, TN 38101-1979

After Hours (see Telephone calls)

If you need medical advice for urgent problems when our office is closed, you can call our exchange at: 901.937.6171. The operator will obtain all of the necessary information for the on-call nurse to return your call.

We contract with a group of well-trained nurses to return your phone calls. We have great confidence in these experienced pediatric nurses in giving advice to our families. The nurse can help you to determine if your child needs to be seen or if home care measures are OK until the office opens. Remember, if there is a question or problem that the nurse cannot answer, they will contact the on-call physician for assistance. The nurses will also assist in referring you for after hours care if it is needed.

Frequently Asked Questions

There are lots of sites on the internet to get health advice and ask questions about specific diseases. This is not one of those sites. (See Favorite Child Health Links) Our purpose here is not to give specific medical advice, but to answer questions related to our office practice.

Pediatric Consultants, PC
Notice of Privacy Practices for Protected Health Information

THIS NOTICE DESCRIBES HOW MEDICAL INFORMATION ABOUT YOU MAY BE USED AND DISCLOSED AND HOW YOU CAN GET ACCESS TO THIS INFORMATION

USES AND DISCLOSURES OF HEALTH INFORMATION

We are required by law to protect the privacy of protected health information, provide this notice about our privacy practices, and follow the information practices that are described in this notice.

This office is permitted by federal privacy laws to make uses and disclosures of your health information for purposes of treatment, payment, and health care operations. Protected health information is the information we create and obtain in providing our services to you. Such information may include documenting your symptoms, examination and test results, diagnoses, treatment, and applying for future care or treatment. It also includes billing documents for those services.

Example of use of health information for treatment purposes:

• If during the course of your chinos treatment the physician determines a consult with a specialist will be needed, we will share your information with the specialist and obtain their input.

• When we seek payment, we will provide information about your child and the care given requested by your health insurance company.

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