I was a patient at Stillwater Primary care after CHPC shut down. I don't even know where to begin as it was nothing but issues.
At my first appointment with Joseph, a guy named Michael walked into the room to treat me. As a woman, I was very confused. When I discussed my GI issues as well as severe fatigue and muscle weakness, he told me it didn't warrant a referral. The refusal to refer out anywhere seemed like an ongoing trend with this practice. After getting dismissed at this visit, I waited a few months to return until my symptoms became unmanageable and I started rapidly losing significant weight.
I then saw Jennifer Bernache before she abruptly left without informing me despite being in and out of the emergency room. She told me there was nothing she could do but again, she wouldn't refer me to anyone who could possibly help. She disregarded my labs and symptoms despite being visibly sick.
After she left, I was seen by Robert Amrien. That's when things went from bad to worse.
During my first visit, I brought my husband. Robert validated me and addressed my issues. Yet on the following visit when I went alone, his whole demeanor changed from that point forward. He was very short with me and refused every referral I requested. He even turned down the referals I was given by the doctors at the ER and urgent care. He refused to send me to a GI specialist and insisted that none of my symptoms warrant an endocrinologist referral.
Robert would regularly proclaim that he works at Mass General as if that made dismissing my concerns okay. During our last visit, I had asked him about the CT scan he was supposed to send me for 3 weeks prior. I had to make a follow up to ask again because the staff insisted that was the only way to reach him. During that appointment, he lied and told me that my insurance repeatedly denied the CT scan and that he's probably going to need to do a peer to peer. Something felt off about his story so I looked into it myself and confirmed my insurance, the imaging company AND the receptionist at Stillwater that he lied to me. He never sent the request. After the visit, on top of lying to my face, he put in my notes that I would benefit from a psychological evaluation!
He overlooked my abnormal labs and told me that the neck CT scan he finally sent me for was "normal." It wasn't. They found a calcified nodule in my thyroid. Only after I called him out on it did he admit that it was not "normal." Despite knowing my symptoms, family history and seeing my labs, he refused to help me and told me that there was nothing more he can do. He didn't care about how sick I was and told me to wait until January -it was October.
I'm glad that I didn't listen to him! At that point, I unexplainably lost 30% of my body weight in well under a year and was covered in bruises. I felt incredibly ill. He tried to blame my ADHD treatment for my "anxiety."
Robert's one suggestion was to go on disability. He said he'd help with the paperwork. The woman who called me from Stillwater about it told me that the paperwork would be "too tedious." I still can't believe he suggested I give up and go on disability!
Ever since I switched practices, I found a doctor who is happy to help me rule things out and send referrals. She got more done in a week than multiple providers at Stillwater did for me in 5 months. I thank god because turns out I have been living with a very serious thyroid disease and GI issues that both require close monitoring and treatment. The delay in proper treatment didn't do me any favors.
I posted my experience on their Facebook page and they blocked me. So I hope that this review can help others not make the same mistake I did.
If you're a woman with chronic health issues, I would avoid this place at all costs. Heck, I wouldn't recommend this place to my worst enemy. I needed help and was met with stigma, neglect, abandonment and gaslighting. I never thought I'd receive such a low standard of care from people I should be able to trust with my health. read more