The worst experience comes from the supporting staff. Although there is new personnel at the time I swapped primary care physicians.
It was impossible to get a prescription refilled with CVS even though it is a preferred pharmacy for Blue Shield and this doctor is in-network. I suspect that they have an affiliation with the pharmacy across from the office called Chinatown Pharmacy. A few times the staff mentioned that I should use the pharmacy across from their office for convenience. I live 10 miles away, my preferred CVS is down the street. Whose convenience is it for?
The problem with their recommended pharmacy is that they overcharge, by a lot. A prescription medicated eye drop for glaucoma patients usually costs $2 out-of-pocket with medicare, their preferred pharmacy charges $20 out-of-pocket. There was also an incident where the pharmacy swapped for a different eye drop than prescribed (same active ingredients, different formula) because that the other type was not available. That caused an allergic reaction which the doctor's front desk staff refused to even acknowledge that was caused by the swap. It took several calls for them to even understand that it's a different medication. Prior to that, they demanded that I come down for a checkup.
I've switched to CVS since that time and each month, it's painful to get a prescription refilled. I would have to call them after sending a refill request via CVS and then they either don't bother until I follow up again or they fill it out incorrectly. There's also a woman at the front desk, a fluent Vietnamese speaker with a heavy accent when speaking English, that refuses to send prescriptions to CVS citing that it's against the law to do it electronically and that I would have to drive down and pick up the prescription or use their recommended pharmacy. Even when I show up in person to pick up the prescription, she provides it on the wrong form and CVS did not accept it. CVS then had to call the doctor over the phone in order to clear the prescription. When I called after everything was resolved to point out their mistake, the same woman tells me to come down so they can give me a new physical form.
As a side note, when you are prescribed a controlled substance, the doctor's office can either give you a designated physical prescription form for controlled substances or they can phone it in with the pharmacy. For everything else, it can be done electronically and with CVS they could opt to have certain medication auto-refill. They don't bother allowing auto-refill which forces you to call them each month so that they can recommend using their preferred pharmacy. The woman that insisted that I pick up the prescription in person had no idea what she's doing, or she was giving me a hard time in order to entice using pharmacy across from their office as a solution.
I recently scheduled an annual checkup about a month ago and the front desk staff informed me that I would have to come into the office and that they no longer cater to tele-visits. The front desk staff joked that the pandemic is over (I laughed in jest). I was not amused! To be frank, the staff's joke is fine and pokes fun at the situation. It underscores the ridiculousness of the office's policy of no longer supporting tele-visits during a pandemic and your patient is in his late 70! I've had enough of putting up with this shenanigan for over a year and so I've switched to a new primary care physician and I couldn't be more satisfied.
If you are considering this office as your primary care then consider a different office if you want to use CVS or Wallgreens or any other pharmacy other than the one across from their office. If you want flexibility and convenience then this is definitely not the place. As I mentioned at the beginning of the review, their staff recently changed, but the office's policy is still ridiculous despite this.
I also want to drop a note that this review is not a direct criticism of Dr. Luu and his experience or expertise. This review is for his staff and the people that manage his office and their lack of professionalism and questionable behavior. read more
