Osteopathic PDX

Nov 2024

I don't even know where to start about my experience with trying to get in to see Dr. Esmer. I cannot write about his bedside manner or how he is in regards to caring for his patients since I didn't get the chance to. After seeing my primary care dr., she recommended that I see a DO, someone more specialized and with more knowledge and guidance than what she's been able to help with the last few years. After letting my primary care dr. gynecologist, and my outpatient care dr. know what the next move was, they were all on board. My primary care dr. recommended a few DO's she knew personally. Once I got home, I started the process of finding a new dr. Either no one was accepting new patients , they retired, or sadly left town. On June 24th., 2024, I spent several hours with my insurance company and calling numerous clinics and private practices to see if they were accepting new patients: that's when I found Osteopathic PDX. After reading the dr's bio and reading a few positive reviews, I called to see if he was welcoming new patients. Dianne, the office manager, collected some information and put me on the books for Aug 26th., 2024, which was the soonest Monday they could see me since Monday's are my days off. I was shocked and supper bummed that the wait was so long to be seen. I patiently waited for that day to come just to receive a call by Dianne, the morning of having to cancel my apt. due to the dr. not coming into the office that day. Dianne rescheduled the apt., and the soonest Monday was September 1st., 2024. This apt. was then again canceled the day of as well. Although I was not happy, both my primary care and treatment dr. encouraged me to make one last ditch effort in rescheduling another apt. I was thinking "the dr. clearly does not like working on Monday's." Yet again, I was rescheduled for Oct., 21st. Sunday night, I received a voicemail by Dianne saying something to the effect that the dr. had something come up and that my apt. would need to be rescheduled. No. No, I sure will never be "rescheduling" another apt. with this dr., screaming out loud. I've now spent the last 4 months time waiting to be seen by this provider, and rescheduling for a 4th time is something I will not do. Working in the medical field myself, I understand that things come up with dr's and or their staff. Unfortunately, having to move patients around or reschedule them is something that happens from time to time. It personally hurts when I have to make these kind of calls to patients. However, Dianne should've known that this was 3rd cancellation now. There's one thing I know working as a surgical assistant, and that the surgeon I work for and myself would have skipped a lunch break, (as we often do anyway), or come to work an hour early, and or stay an hour later to make it right with that one patient; especially for the one who's been cancelled on one too many times. Dr's and their staff often have that ability to do just that and I wish they would've shown the compassion to do so. Perhaps in the future, when the dr. needs to reschedule the patients, you could color code or have a system in place of how many times you've had to cancel that one particular pt. because every time Dianne would call to cancel my apt., it's like she was unaware that she's now called me 3 times prior cancelling my appointments. I truly felt like she had no care whatsoever for my time spent waiting to be seen. That is was just another day at the office. It's a shame that I even have to write this review. And believe me, it's taken me weeks to think about this. I kept asking myself "should I write a review or should I just let it go?" Something over the course of the last few weeks kept nudging me to do so. Maybe now I will feel better about the situation? Maybe I just needed to write all this to get it off my chest? Because I do patient care, I felt the right thing to do is to let whomever know, who's thinking of becoming a

Feb 2023

Dr. Esmer is excellent at treating my back pain and overall dysfunction in my back muscles and pelvis. He's also treated my husband for years. He's gentle, kind, and funny. I really appreciate having him as a resource.

May 2021

Skillful manual therapy. Kind and caring practitioner. Quiet, peaceful office setting. Street parking within a block or so. I had a difficult neck/rib problem and Dr. Esmer helped me quite a bit in a single session. Several other practitioners including a chiropractor had tried but his session helped me turn the corner on that problem. This office bills some health insurance plans; call to ask. I'm able to see him for a $40 copay; I'm used to paying out of pocket for this sort of treatment so I feel very fortunate. Since the pandemic, he is often booked out several weeks to a month, so plan ahead.