Scripps Coastal Medical Center Hillcrest — Local services in San Diego

This review is not about my primary care provider, who is one of the most excellent doctors I ever have, but with Scripps as a medical organization that puts profit before patients, fosters organizational incompetence over efficiency, customer care, and feedback. Scripps's employees in scheduling department, insurance submission, and billing departments were atrocious and lacks customer care. Scripps lacks a feedback process or survey after patient interaction so they can address issues and/or provide training.

I changed insurance in June this year. Every time I call to schedule to see a doctor or have lab work completed, I always make it a point to bring up that I have changed insurance, to make sure any approval or billing is sent to my current insurance. Apparently, at Scripps, it can take months for their employees to figure that out even after a patient brings it up over and over, multiple times.

Even worse, Scripps will request approval of procedure with my old insurance, schedule me for it, and when I ask who approved it -- it wasn't my new insurance company! I had to cancel vacation for a procedure only to reschedule/cancel last minute because Scripps did not ask my new insurance company's approval. For a medical care facility, this is not acceptable.

Until September this year, my billing details on Scripps website show that Scripps was submitting bills to both previous and current insurance provider. Why?

Another thing that I found out, if I stay with my new insurance provider's network of imaging and labs, I will not have to pay excessive amount on what Scripps has been billing me and my insurance. This means, Scripps's lab work is padded excessively with high costs than most Imaging centers or labs. When I asked Scripps Billing Department why I have to pay more with Scripps lab than other labs, she simply said you have to go where your insurance recommends. To me, that is a true sign that Scripps put profits before patient care, without an organizational intent of lowering costs to benefit patients and make them competitive in healthcare market.

I asked a friend, a registered nurse who reviews and process billings of medical facilities, hospitals and clinics if this is a common practice -- that Scripps bills higher than other facilities -- and he empathically said yes. Hence, he refers patients to go to other centers, imaging, or lab.

Ever wonder why healthcare is expensive? Three words: Profits...

This place is so difficult...parking, customer service via phone, office staff....they take forever and NEVER follow up...health care here has been way less than optimal despite having what I thought was a decent doctor. Seems like most of the doctors here are off on Friday and some work only half day on Wednesdays. For a referral to see a specialist, you can expect to travel over 50 miles beyond SD county and usually these doctors are booked out for months...with insurance premiums at an all time high, I'd prefer to have reliable, reasonable and responsible care, close to home! Even simple requests fall upon deaf ears...good luck ever reaching your doctors, customer service staff form an unbreakable line of defense and there's never a return call from the doctor to address heal concerns...it's always a medical assistant who ends up taking a message and promising to have doctor call back.....crickets. Ass hat central. So sad. Even pediatrics is under par for optimal treatment, especially re: asthma treatment. I asked for referral to specialist after my little boys symptoms became so severe...finally once we were able to see someone, it was stated that his asthma is not being controlled...now three additional meds are being prescribed for my poor baby...all of this AFTER repeat visits to his primary care...

I am not one to blatantly complain about bad experiences online but this was just horrible. My grandfather was moved here for maintenance after a long stay at Scripps Mercy hospital across the street. The treatment was awful. My family and I had to constantly remind the professionals there about the problems surrounding my grandfather's many conditions. They were slow, un-attentive, and distracted. They had forgot to wash his mouth or clean his teeth for weeks! Around the third or so time we had reminded them of this, they sort of suggested that it would be easier if we did it for them. Pathetic. The room was dingy and did not appear to be very clean, with a horrible view of a brick building so there was no sunlight. Worst of all, when my grandfather passed, my mother and sister both received a phone call that sort of mumbled "um, hi, we are calling to inform you that the patient has expired." "PATIENT HAS EXPIRED!" I understand the need for euphemism at times, but this just added to the confusion. The woman on the phone, who sounded confused at what she was given to say, immediately went into details on how long we had to pick up the body. This was the most insulting, lackluster experience me or my family has ever experienced with a hospital, though I supposed we shouldn't have expected much, coming from...