If I could give a location zero stars, I would. New Yorkers needing retinal specialists, BEWARE!
I've been going to the practice of Doctors Pieroni and Khadem for about four months, after being referred here by my eye doctor because of some tears in my retinas. My first few appointments were a mixed bag -- in some I was checked in, taken back for the usual up-front eye tests and given eye dilation drops, sent back out for the requisite 30 minutes for my eyes to fully dilate, and then seen -- one hour appointment, max. More frequently, I would arrive to a packed waiting room and wait for an hour before even being seen. But one of my most recent experiences takes the cake and is the impetus for wanting a new retinal specialist:
I was going in for the *last* of my laser surgeries to correct my retinal tears. My doctor is actually Dr. Pieroni, whose bedside manner I can now appreciate when compared with Dr. Khadem. I checked in with the receptionist and sat down to wait. After about five minutes I was called back for the eye tests and dilation drops by one of the teenagers that inexplicably seem to be working there. Seriously, they are staffed by TEENAGERS, that spend their time schlepping patients around from room to room, administering some of the more basic tests, and GOSSIPING the whole time about their lives and what they are going to do that night. Which I find a titch unprofessional for a doctor's office, but nevermind that. After 30 minutes they call my name and I think to myself "great, this is going to be a quickie!" I go back and they inform me that actually, Dr. Pieroni is on vacation in France, they have tried to call me to reschedule and left a voicemail. Turns out they had my phone number incorrect, failed to notify me when I checked in, failed to notify me again when they took me back to dilate my eyes, and just now realized this was a problem.
So, I might have been OK with the phone number mix-up, or not realizing when I checked in (under DR. PIERONI, mind you). I would have been understandably pissed, but gotten over it. But the fact that they actually started to process me as a patient and dilated my eyes before realizing the problem? No medical practice should be able to make THAT many mistakes. These are my EYES for god-sake, if you can't manage to figure out my paperwork which is pretty simple, how can I trust you not to eff up my EYES?!?!
They tell me I can either reschedule or I can see Dr. Khadem. Seeing as I have a JOB and have already taken off the afternoon for this (and many other!) appointment, my eyes are already dilated (effects usually last about 3 hours), its already a wasted afternoon for me, so I say yes please, I'd like to see Dr. Khadem. But WHEN? They assure me I am on the list to be seen and they will call me back soon.
So, I head back to the waiting room and proceed to wait. And wait. And wait. And wait. And I see everyone who has come in after me taken back and be seen. And I wait some more. Finally, after an hour an a half I loudly complain to the receptionist who promises to check things out and lo and behold! Someone calls me back.
I finally meet with Dr. Khadem, whose bedside manner is less than desirable. I express my displeasure with this fiasco, with which he responds with "Well you're really lucky. Your eyes are a mess." Huh.
He then asks me if I want to continue with my last laser session. Uh, duh, I didn't wait around your office for two hours only to be condescendingly told I was lucky to see you. So I get sent to sit outside the laser room, where someone is already in there. And, I wait some more (I think about fifteen minutes). Finally he pops into that room, converses with whoever is in there, and sends them away. My turn. And, he administers the lasers in the worst experience I have had to date (out of four, so I'm not exactly inexperienced). The session is long, unrelenting, and painful, and I wish to god that Dr. Pieroni is there because she is much nicer and gentler. Finally, we finish and dazed and blinded, I am handed a tissue to wipe the tears and eye-lens-goop sliding down my face. I am then snapped at to "stop touching your eye, you'll give yourself a lesion!" and told that if I need more time to recover (more than the two minutes I've been there waiting for my vision to return so I can see to walk out), I can sit outside in the waiting area because they need the room.
So. That sums up my experience. Oh, and after that session I developed a liquid build-up in my eye (sounds gross right?), which has never happened before, had the longest bout of blurry vision (lasting into the beginning of my vacation the next week), and my pupils have still not returned to normal (the left one is bigger than the right, a month after this all went down).
So. While I would maybe recommend Dr. Pieroni, I cannot endorse her practice that made the gross mistake of processing me when she wasn't even here, and I definitely do NOT recommend Dr. Khadem. read more