Questions to Ask the Doctor at Your Parent's First Appointment

How to Use This List in a Fifteen-Minute Appointment

You are not going to ask thirty-one questions. Nobody does. Print the list, read it in the waiting room, and mark the five that matter most today. Number them one to five, because appointments end abruptly and you want the important one asked first, not last.

Bring two copies. Hand one across the desk at the start and say: I have five questions, may I ask them at the end. That single sentence changes the shape of the appointment. The doctor now knows the visit has a second half, and you are no longer the person interrupting.

Sit where you can write. Ask before you take notes; almost nobody minds, and asking makes the notebook normal rather than adversarial. If your parent is in the room and can answer, let them answer first, then add what you have seen. Write what you observed and when it happened, with dates, not what you think it means. That distinction keeps your notes useful to the person who is qualified to interpret them.

• A one-page list of every medicine in the house, including over-the-counter items and supplements
• The name and phone number of every other doctor or clinic involved
• Insurance card, photo ID, and any referral paperwork
• A dated page of what you have observed, written as facts and dates
• Two printed copies of your questions, one to hand over
• A pen that works and a folder to carry paper home in

Questions About This Doctor's Role

Start here, because the answers determine who you call for everything else over the next year. Families waste extraordinary amounts of time calling the wrong office. Ten minutes spent establishing who does what, and on which number, saves you hours in the months after.

These eight questions are also the safest way to open. They are administrative, they are easy to answer quickly, and they signal that you are organised rather than anxious. That reputation is worth having with an office you will be calling often.

Write the answers as a small directory on the inside cover of your folder: name, role, office number, best method, and who covers when they are away. Copy it to whoever else in the family might have to make a call.

• What is your role in my parent's care, and which other doctors are involved?
• Who is the main point of contact if something changes between visits?
• How long is a standard appointment, and how do we book a longer one?
• May I sit in on appointments, and what do you need in writing to allow that?
• What is the best way to send you information between visits — portal, fax or phone?
• Which of my parent's records do you already have, and what is missing?
• How do I get a copy of today's visit summary?
• How far ahead should the next appointment be booked?

Questions About the Medicines Already in the House

This is the section where you hand over information and ask what happens next. You are not looking anything up beforehand and you are not offering opinions about what should be stopped. You are producing a complete, accurate list and asking a qualified person to look at it.

Completeness matters more than tidiness. Bring everything: prescriptions, the things bought off the shelf, the vitamin somebody recommended, the tube in the bathroom cabinet nobody has mentioned. If you cannot write it all down, put the boxes in a bag and bring the bag.

Ask for the answers in writing, or write them yourself and read them back. Then file the list where the whole family can see the same version, and put the date on it. A medication list without a date is a rumour.

• Here is the full list, including over-the-counter items and supplements — does it match what you have on file?
• Which of these are prescribed by you, and which by someone else?
• Is there anything here you want a pharmacist to review?
• What should we do with the medicines in the cabinet that are no longer taken?
• How do we request a refill, and how many days ahead?
• Which pharmacy do you send prescriptions to, and can that be changed?
• Who should we call with a question about a medicine — your office or the pharmacist?

Questions About Tests, Referrals and What Happens Next

Most of the delay in the months ahead comes from one gap: nobody said who was chasing what. A test is ordered, a referral is made, and both sides assume the other is booking it. Six weeks disappear.

So ask for the mechanics, every time. Who books it. Who calls whom. By what date you should worry. Write a date next to every answer, even a rough one, and put that date in your phone. When it passes, you call — and you call knowing exactly what you are chasing, which makes the call short.

The last question in this group is the most useful one on the whole page. Asking what to bring next time turns a scattered visit into a series, and it makes the next appointment shorter for everyone.

• What happens next, and by when?
• Which tests are being ordered today, and where does my parent go for them?
• Do the tests need an appointment, or can we walk in?
• How and when will results come — will someone call, or do we call you?
• If we have not heard by a certain date, who should we chase?
• Is a referral being made? To whom, and who books it — your office or us?
• How long is the usual wait for that referral?
• What should we bring to the next visit that we did not bring today?

Questions About Contact, Permissions and Records

There is usually a form. Without it, a receptionist cannot legally tell you whether the appointment happened. Ask for it at the first visit, sign it at the first visit, and keep a copy — you will be asked for it again at some point by someone who cannot find theirs.

The same applies to the portal. Being added as an authorised user takes two minutes at a desk and two weeks by phone. Do it while you are standing there.

Records requests have a process and often a fee. Ask now, before there is any urgency, because the day you need the records quickly is the day the process matters. Note where the request form lives and how long it takes.

• What form do you need on file so that you can speak to me about my parent?
• Is there a patient portal, and can I be added as an authorised user today?
• What is the daytime office number, and what happens after hours?
• Which number do we use for a question that is not urgent?
• Do you complete forms for insurance, employers or care agencies, and what is the process?
• How do we request copies of records, is there a fee, and how long does it take?
• Who handles scheduling, and who handles prescriptions?
• Is there anything you would like us to track or write down before the next visit?

How to Record the Answers So They Still Work in a Month

One sheet per appointment. Date, doctor's name and location across the top, always in the same place, so the pages stack into something you can flick through.

Question on the left, answer on the right. Write the answer in the words you were given rather than your summary of it — you will not remember which parts were yours. If you did not catch something, say so and ask for it again. Nobody has ever minded.

Before you stand up, read the answers back: so, the test is on the fourteenth, your office books it, and I call if I have not heard by the twenty-first. Thirty seconds. It catches roughly one misunderstanding per visit.

Outside the room, photograph the sheet and send it to whichever sibling is not there. Then file the paper behind the appointments tab, newest at the front. The stack becomes the answer to when did this start, which is the question you will be asked over and over.

• Date, doctor and location at the top of every sheet, in the same place
• Questions on the left, answers on the right, in their words
• Read the answers back before you leave the room
• Photograph the sheet and send it to the family the same day
• File the paper behind one tab, newest at the front

Questions