And the Bureaucracy Rears Its Ugly Head

So my oncologist agrees to give me a referral to the Seattle Cancer Care Alliance where I can get a second opinion from a provider at one of the country's premier cancer care organizations. In fact, I'm told that referrals for second opinions are pretty much "automatic" for oncology.

Their definition of "automatic" and mine are apparently not the same. The procedure, best as I can make out, is this:

Oncologist submits request for approval for the referral to Group Health finance or some similar decision making entity. 

Entity reviews the request and, presumably, approves, but does not tell anyone that it has granted the approval. Instead, my file is just updated to show the approval. 

I have to call SCCA and let them know that I've been diagnosed with cancer and request the referral to them for a second opinion. SCCA, then, has to log into my electronic medical record at Group Health and locate the approved referral.

The process takes a week and four phone calls from me. Moreover, SCCA won't schedule the appointment until they have the approved referral. What's worse, the first available slot is three weeks out from the time they finally locate it. Even asking another one of the people I know who knows people is only able to shave a few days off the wait time. 

It starts to seem like the entire world has cancer.* 


* Aside from the people I know who are dealing with their own cancers, the number of people churning through both Group Health and SCCA is astounding. The lag time for appointments at either place is weeks, and when I finally see it, SCCA's facility is huge, and it is packed with people there for treatment. Sad and scary.