Dr. Julius Shulman, MD

I have just made my annual appointment with Dr. Schulman's office. The phone was answered promptly and courteously. Although my appointment was set for two weeks out, this physician is a highly sought after specialist and should be busy. I've seen Dr. Schulman many times and he has never tried to talk me into any unnecessary surgery such as LASIK or have staff talk me into buying my glasses from his practice. Two years ago, I began using Medicare and Dr. Schulman's office gladly accepted that and I was not made to feel that I was going to be treated any differently. I have found Dr. Schulman to be a complete gentleman, always wearing a suit and tie and addressing his patients with respect, and not indifference. In my opinion, Dr. Schulman is a first rate ophthalmologist with a caring and competent staff.

I have macular degeneration with requires injection of drug into eye to stop retinal bleeding, and saw this doc as a new patient- during visit there were some other docs in office, presumably post docs or some such- at end of visit Shulman told me to call if I had any problems, not injecting eye- I felt some unexpressed consternation from the other docs in room, but ignored it- later called Shulman to report a possible problem, call not returned- called again, call still not returned but I was unsure if he got a message, was leaving on a trip, called twice again on my return but call still not returned, made emergency appointment with a new retina specialist and began a series of needed eye injections, having lost vision in half of visual field. Because I am on Medicare which all Weill Cornell docs are required to accept, I think that is the likely reason Dr Shulman failed to give me necessary treatment, while failing to inform me-

The waiting time was 1 hr and 45 minutes, after which the doctor spent about 5 minutes with me. Instead of washing his hands, he used Purell, which might be just as good, but I trust soap and water more. The office was like a big factory, with about 5 or 6 patient rooms where people were stashed away, making sure that didn't slip away other doctors. The total disregard for the patient's time by scheduling too many appointments knowing well that the wait time would be extremely long is deplorable.