A Short Story from my Chamber!
Hi, there! How are you? I hope that you are doing great. I am here with another short story from my chamber. It's about a patient who made a fuss regarding the price of a procedure.
Even though we are not ENT specialists, we do "ear wash" for impacted earwax in our clinic. We put a drop in the ear, wait for 10-15 minutes, and irrigate the ear canal with normal saline. In most cases, we can clean the ear canal. Before COVID, we used to charge 2 OMR for each ear. After COVID, the price was increased to 3 OMR per ear. The patient paid the amount happily, and I found no patient fighting for the money until this time!
Before going to the story, here is a bit of a tangent. Insurance patients pay a "small amount" or "no amount", depending on their premiums. Some patients pay 1 OMR or less for any procedure in the clinic. But all the cash patients pay the full amount!
A middle-aged patient came to clean his ears. He did it before in our clinic. I even did the cleaning a few years back. As he was familiar with the procedure, I didn't talk about the price. He didn't ask either!
I could clean both ears successfully. The problem started during the payment. For both ears, the amount would be 6 OMR! He became quite angry. Why 6 OMR? Before, he used to pay only 0.30 OMR! Hearing this, I was surprised! Which doctor cleaned your ears with 0.30 OMR only?? He thought I made up the high bill! I asked nurses to check the previous billings. The patient didn't wait. He was furious. He gave the money and left angrily! He didn't even take the ear drops I prescribed for him.
Later, we found out that previously he had insurance coverage. Hence, he paid the amount he claimed to be paid. He was correct from his side. But this time, he didn't have insurance coverage. Hence, he had to pay as a cash customer! All fusses were just due to a misunderstanding!
Please share your opinion about his story :)
Thank you!
Hafiz
[Already published on Blurt]