Gregory G. Stiefel, DO

Dr Stiefel has been a "gem" taking care of our 88 yo mother.

Dr Stiefel is very knowledgable and takes his time with patients. He is considerate and friendly. His diagnosis of my illness was perfect.

Dr. and his staff are compassionate and listen, really listen, to the issues that brought you to their office. I drive 40 minutes for an appointment and it is well worth it considering the care and treatment they provide.

I am a heart patient who was instructed to abruptly discontinue medication after being prescribed it by my doctor, Dr. Gregory Stiefel, for approximately 3 years. The drug was Tramadol. The drug has a synthetic opiate combined with an anti-depressive component. I never had any symptoms of depression. His instructions were to drop from 1 pill 3x per day, to 2x to 1x without ANY OTHER TIMING INSTRUCTIONS. As a result I suffered extreme withdrawal symptoms, including palpitations, sore muscles, restlessness and sleeplessness, which he refused to even discuss. After speaking with my thoracic surgeon, he confirmed the improper weaning schedule and indicated that I needed to wean much more gradually and that my symptoms would be assuaged by something like a Xanax or Ativan. Fact is, Dr.Stiefel had already been prescribing me Xanax 0.25mg for over a year. However, I had not found the need to take them for some time and had 3 left. Since they were extremely low dosage I took one prior to… bedtime several days ago and was finally able to sleep some of the night. Yet, when I contacted his office he refused to discuss the matter with me and NOW decides not to refill the prescription. I not only find this very calloused and uncompassionate, but dangerous in that Dr. Stiefel has clearly not had enough experience with this particular drug to be prescribing it let alone instruct (heart) patients how to wean off of it. To reiterate, as confirmed by my thoracic surgeon, patients should not decrease their dosage by more than 25% at any given time until under 20mg per day. In addition, dosages should be split to ensure even blood content throughout the day. Dr. Stiefel is clearly ignorant of those facts. This complaint will obviously not undo the symptoms I am still struggling with, and likely have no impact at all on Dr. Stiefel. Nonetheless I do feel compelled to articulate my experience so that maybe he can learn from my suffering.

Pros: He was nice and didn't rush my appointment. Cons: I was concerned and had some questions about some of the numbers in my blood work. I was unable to speak to him directly and instead of talking to me, he left a message with the woman at the front desk saying the numbers were normal and if I didn't like that then I could get a 2nd opinion.

Thorough. Ridged. Only gives one refill for medications. Talks directly to the patient. Information from others not accepted well.

Very caring and through.