This is my first Yelp review, and I hope it will help other Portlanders avoid what I've experienced…read morewith this provider. While he is capable of a friendly bedside manner, his host of administrative issues and ethically questionable billing practices negatively impacted me--and my health. I would advise others to seek another primary care provider.
I scheduled a wellness visit with Shay (Dr. Hosseinion's first name) online a year ago after moving to Portland. During this first visit, we talked through my medical history and he also refilled two existing prescriptions from my prior MD. No physical exam beyond listening to heart/lungs. He wrote me a letter for my employer stating that he had seen me "for an annual wellness visit." Finally, he ordered a single blood test; I declined the standard panel.
After the appointment, he billed my insurance company for $390. I wrote to ask about this--my last handful of wellness exams/physicals were covered at 100%--and he told me the care I received was defined as a "problem visit," offering to see me for a second visit to use the wellness exam benefit.
I spoke with my insurance company, who confirmed the visit should have been billed as a wellness appointment plus an additional code for extra services. I contacted Shay's offsite billing office to request this change. I was willing to pay for the appointment, but believed it was billed improperly, resulting in an unfairly high balance left to me.
It took one year of calls every month or two to get a response: No, he will not change the billing to include the wellness code or compromise on the balance. Why did it take so long to get a response? Per the billing office rep: "There's nothing we could do. We're not in his office. He's very hard to reach."
In the meantime, I decided not to return for a second "wellness" visit, as Shay suggested, after my insurance company told me that getting lab results but billing for a wellness visit would be fraudulent. Instead, I waited a month, then requested a copy of my lab results three times in December. And again on Jan 4th. And again on Jan 10th.
Finally, I called the lab, where a tech assured me the results were delivered to Shay in late November, less than 24 hours after the test.
I sent Shay an email expressing my dismay at the wait; he did not apologize, but said they'd mail me a copy. I waited another couple weeks. When it didn't arrive, an assistant told me it was lost in the mail. I finally went to the office in person and got a paper copy.
In the midst of this, the billing office told me part of the reason I wasn't receiving an invoice was because they had the wrong address on file for me - received from Shay's office (which had a copy of my driver's license).
In any case, the labs showed a treatable medical issue -- something I would have liked to have known about ASAP. All told, it took me about two months to get that piece of paper.
About six months later, and some eight months after the initial appointment, I got an email from Shay. He said he had my lab results and asked me to schedule an appointment. He said he found a problem in them.
I would have appreciated more timely, accurate and honest communication from this physician and his assistant regarding billing and my lab results. I could have been informed during my visit that the wellness billing code would not be used in any way (using it plus another code could have, per the insurance company, mitigated some of the cost). Because such communication was lacking (and because this doctor wrote a letter to the opposite effect), I think some compromise on the final balance due would have been fair. Shay had paperwork explaining that refilling prescriptions could result in additional billing, but I could not have predicted that the entire visit would be coded to the maximum possible reimbursement. I think it is unfair to expect lay people to have this level of knowledge, particularly as there is a variance among providers in billing practices for these visits.
At the least, I would have expected timely communication of my lab result. I would have begun taking a needed supplement months earlier if I had seen my lab results, and would have appreciated a simple acknowledgement that my health was comprised when I didn't receive it.
For what it's worth, I paid my bill in full before submitting this review, and within days of hearing back from the billing office.
