My family and I have been patients of Dr. Mike Ausmus for 30+ years. He was wonderful. Over the years, though, St. Luke's primary care became worse and worse. The bureaucracy became impenetrable. Patients could not schedule an appointment without waiting months - even in an emergency or when post-hospitalization checkups where immediately needed. Patients could not call their doctors. The Central Scheduling office that handles all patient communication knows nothing about medical care, always says it will be 5 to 6 months to get an appointment, even in an emergency. And, the Urgent Care office is notoriously horrible; even St. Luke's doctors recommend going elsewhere.
Since Mike retired it has become infinitely worse. We received a letter telling us we'd been "reassigned" to another doctor - like cattle. However, that was not true. When we called to make an appointment for an urgent issue, we were told we did not actually have a doctor. We would need to schedule a new patient appointment - 9 months later. I scheduled new patient appointments for each member of our family, and the doctor cancelled some of them and did not show up for the others. It's been a year now, and our children have not seen a doctor.
St. Luke's management has lost its way. By putting up all these barriers between patients and doctors, they are effectively committing malpractice.
I would strongly recommend choosing another primary care office. read more
