@contentandwell I agree completely. In the last six months this trend has run rampant in our town. The hospital (a small, local, individually owned and run by a local Board of Directors) bought out almost all of the doctors in town. The hospital runs everything from billing to treatment. It does not work. The practice my PCP is in refused to "join" the big boys, so we can see her and they have an answering service on the weekend, but that practice cannot send patients to the local hospital since they don't belong to the system. That's what happened to my endocrinologist (the only one in town). They ran him out and hired a young woman with Dr. in front of her name and got it from a "university" from in the middle of the West Indies somewhere. Other practices have joined and a lone, rogue dr. doesn't have a chance. They join and as JK said they work 9-5 and have no bookwork or concern for patients. Recently my husband's heart doctors in a bigger city have joined their business hospital association, but they are with a very large hospital, so I am not anxious when we see them. However, in the small town, it's wrong and chaotic and very dangerous.
Carol