Dr. Grace Mari Kasamatsu, MD

Dr. K is an amazing doctor. Both of my kids have gone to her since birth.

Expect to stand at the front desk with a receptionist refusing to acknowledge you for ten minutes, then sit in the waiting room for a half hour, then wait in the examining room for 45 minutes -- with your child or children bouncing off the walls. Why they need the patients to arrive so long before the doctor is available is beyond me, as is her inability to care what a nightmare this is. No way is the average wait time just 25 minutes. I've never seen her within an hour. But management skills aside, she's a great doctor.

It was a second visit and would be my last visit to her office. It was full of people waiting for a different doctors and I had to wait about 1 hour and 30 minutes before I could get the immunization shots that my son came for. In the previous visit, we had to wait 30 minutes.

Dr. K is highly effective and an excellent pediatrician. She is second to none.Problems we encountered were mainly with billing people. They never seemed to care about the customers. Once they collected the money, good luck getting them to work with you or the insurance company to get your proper reimbursement.Once, they insisted that we pay for a visit after we switched to a new insurance and the insurance card didn't yet to arrive. So we paid the full amount ($125) for the well-baby visit. After repeated requests, they never bothered to bill the insurance to reimburse us. So we had file a claim with the insurance ourselves, and got refunded only at a discounted rate ($89).Another instance, when the insurance company denied a claim for routine vaccinations because of an error in the billing codes, instead of working with the insurance to correct the billing error, they resubmitted the claim with codes for something else other than routine vaccinations. Valid codes, but the… service were not covered, so the insurance paid them using our Health Saving Account. Again, several times, we requested the office, both verbally and in writing, to work with the insurance to resolve the problem. Nothing was done because they already got their money. We ended up in a hole for about $200.Anyhow, we are still with Beach Pediatrics because of the excellent service of Dr. K. Everything is great if you don't have to deal with billing issues.

My wife is about 8 months pregnant and in our search for a pediatrician we heard good things about Dr. Kasamatsu. My sister's children are both current patients. Our health insurance plan is very unique as it is provided by the FDIC exclusively for employees of failed financial institutions. When my wife called to verify your practice's acceptance of the plan and spoke to the billing supervisor she was unwilling to provide any type of customer service. She simply stated "I have never heard of that plan so we probably dont accept it. The only way she would have heard of this plan is if she had previously dealt with a person who was employed by a financial institution that was acquired by the FDIC. While my wife attempted to explain the plan to the billing supervisor, the billing supervisor continued to state she had never heard of the plan and it would not be accepted. She was willing to make a decision on the acceptance of a new patient based on her knowledge a plan that she… knew nothing about. She was unwilling to take the ID and phone number and make a call to verify coverage after several attempts to provide it. This plan is very widely accepted as it is a non-directional plan in which there is no in and out of network. From the onset of the call, the billing supervisor was very abrupt and once she self determined the plan would not be accepted she became out right rude. This escalated to the point where my wife was forced to end the call because she was getting so upset and wanted to avoid any further stain on her emotions. I then call the main practice office and spoke to someone there and explained the issue. I asked if she would be willing to have her supervisor or someone speak to the billing supervisor re: the acceptance of our health plan. She stated that I needed to speak to the billing supervisor directly. I stated we had already gone down that road and would appreciate some assistance from the office. I was placed on hold. When she returned, she stated she had spoken to the billing supervisor and the billing supervisor stated she had offered to make the call to our insurance company on the call with my wife which is absolutely untrue. I can only imagine the type of customer service that would be provided if we were to allow of child to become a patient of your practice if this is how you treat potential patients on the front end. Like many of your patients, I was willing to overlook the billing and business office staff in order to have a strong doctor, but the stress of dealing with medical bills is enough without having to put up with and rude staff that is unwilling to help. Maybe they should look for other types of employment.

Dr. Kasamatsu is a very good pediatrician, the problem lies with her ancillary staff and to some degree her partners. My son is 18 months old now and I have been struggling with the dilemma of keeping continuity with a good doctor and fighting with her rude and condescending front office and billing staff. I myself am a physician and am fully aware of the demands of a busy outpatient office. But in my opinion, there is no excuse for the busy signal I get 50% of the time I call her office. I had to call for 25 minutes continuously the other day before I finally got through. I'm not trying to win concert tickets, I'm just trying to communicate with my physician's office! I needed to reschedule a well child visit and they couldn't give my a new appointment until a month out, and to make matters worse, the front office person tried to give me a guilt trip for rescheduling. Every time I leave her office, I undergo the same internal debate...is she worth enduring the terrible service her… office staff provide? I finally decided no, and have arranged for my son to transfer care to another pediatrician's office. My 2 cents.