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We welcome you as a prospective/established patient to the Practice and appreciate the opportunity to provide you with medical care. The information that follows is designed to answer many questions that most patients have. We encourage you to browse this website in its entirety. The more you know, the more we can be of service. If you have any questions, please call us during office hours since we do want to be of help.
Dr. Lisa M. Noyes-Duguay is a Board Certified Internist. Her training includes four years of undergraduate study, four years of medical school at the University of Connecticut School of Medicine, and three years of Residency in Internal Medicine at Baystate Medical Center in Springfield, Massachusetts. In November of 2003, she received special training to treat patients with Buprenorphine (Suboxone). She is currently certified to treat up to 100 Suboxone patients. Her special interests include Women's Health, Adolescent Medicine, Preventative Medicine, and Addiction Medicine. Dr. Noyes-Duguay is a member in good standing of the American Medical Association and the Massachusetts Medical Society.
Dr. Noyes-Duguay has a dedicated staff. Her office manager is Paula Gothen, her "right hand". The billing is done outside of the office.
Dr. Noyes-Duguay is presently accepting new patients and will serve as your Primary Care Physician (PCP) if you so choose. Your PCP provides routine physical examinations and pap smears, handles all of your preventative health care, sees you for sick visits, and manages all of your general medical problems. Medical problems requiring a Specialist in a given field are referred out of the office.
Dr. Noyes-Duguay accepts patients starting at 16 years of age. Occasionally, you will find that the wait to become a new patient appears to be long. The reason for this is that we give preference to our established patients first. We do our best to see our established sick patients on the same day that they call the office. This limits the number of new patient appointments that we have available each day. We do not overbook or double book appointments. The average wait when you arrive in the office is about 10 minutes.
The office is open from 9:00 A.M. until 5:00 P.M. Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. The office is closed on Tuesday. Office hours are by appointment only. We are currently re-thinking our office hours to allow for early morning and evening appointments to accommodate our working patients.
We try very hard to run "on-time" since no one likes waiting. When you call, you will be offered the next available appointment. If the problem cannot wait until that time, please let the office manager know and we will make every attempt to get you in sooner. Our policy is to see all emergency patients as soon as possible, but please let us know if it is an emergency. If you are more than 15 minutes late for your appointment, you may lose your slot. This is not to penalize you. It is meant to allow the patients who are on time to be seen promptly.
Calls regarding illness during office hours will initially be referred to the receptionist. She will appropriately triage your call based on what you tell her on the phone. All calls are subsequently reviewed by the physician every day. We ask that all routine calls be made during regular office hours. Please understand that your call may occasionally be answered by our office answering machine. We encourage you to leave a message if this occurs. Ninety percent of our calls are returned promptly, within 10 minutes of you leaving a message. Clearly, if you are in a true emergency situation, please call 911. Calls made after hours (including weekends) will be directed to the answering service. These calls should be reserved for urgent or emergency calls only. There is a physician available for these calls at all times.
Please understand if the receptionist directs you to the emergency room instead of the office. Certain medical problems, including chest pain, difficulty breathing, active bleeding, and dehydration are best dealt with in an emergency room setting.
For lab studies and X-rays, our policy is to call you with the results as we receive them. Most likely, if you have not heard from us, the results are not yet avail able. You will be notified with normal results as well as abnormal results. If you do not hear from us within 4 weeks after having a test done, please call the office for your results. We do not routinely call with mammogram results unless there is a problem. You will receive a letter directly from the radiology department concerning your mammogram results. We are required by law to give results of HIV tests in person.
What occurs in the office is highly confidential. The policy is to discuss problems openly and honestly with our patients. We will discuss problems with family members only at the specific request of the patient. Similarly, medical records are not released without written patient permission.
In an effort to provide the best medical care, a physician is available 24 hours each day by phone. The on-call Dr. is available for urgent calls that cannot wait for the office to open to be answered. Clearly, for emergencies, you may call at any time.
We ask that calls for prescription refills be made during regular office hours. The on-call physician will not re-fill prescriptions outside of office hours. Please check your medications before weekends and holidays to avoid running out.
Our responsibility is to provide you with the best possible medical
care. We have found that being courteous is contagious. We try
hard to meet the needs of all of our patients at all times.
It is important that we try to work together as a team. We need you to tell us if you have problems we are not resolving.
If our office is not adequately meeting your needs, please take the time to let us know. This can either be done with a quick phone call or, if you would prefer, even an anonymous note addressed to Dr. Noyes-Duguay. It is very important for us to have feedback so that we can correct any problems as soon as they arise. We understand that occasionally miscommunications may occur raising confusion or frustration on your part. This would never be done intentionally. Unless you let us know that this has occurred, we cannot help you.
We have tried to accommodate patients by affiliating with as many insurance plans as we see appropriate. We will submit all claims for you unless you prefer us to do otherwise. Medicare no longer always automatically submits to your secondary insurance company. We can submit to the secondary insurance company for you if you give us a copy of your statement from Medicare. All co-pays are due at the time of the visit regardless of your secondary insurance status. We do require that office visits submitted to private insurance plans, such as John Alden and Metropolitan, be paid for at the time of the visit. You will be reimbursed once we receive payment from your insurer.
PLEASE KEEP IN MIND THAT PREVENTION IS THE ROOT OF YOUR HEALTH CARE AND THAT PREVENTION STARTS WITH YOU!!!
ANNUAL PHYSICALS ARE RECOMMENDED FOR ALL PATIENTS OVER THE AGE OF 50.
PELVIC EXAMS ARE RECOMMENDED EVERY ONE TO THREE YEARS IF YOU HAVE HAD THREE NORMAL EXAMS OVER 3 CONSECUTIVE YEARS IN A ROW.
IF YOU HAVE HAD A HYSTERECTOMY, A PELVIC EXAM IS RECOMMENDED EVERY 2 TO 3 YEARS.
BREAST EXAMS AND MAMMOGRAMS ARE RECOMMENDED YEARLY AFTER THE AGE OF 40. A BASELINE MAMMOGRAM IS USUALLY OBTAINED AT THE AGE OF 35.
SCREENING COLONOSCOPIES ARE RECOMMENDED FOR EVERYONE AT THE AGE OF 50. IF THERE IS A FAMILY HISTORY OF COLON CANCER, COLONOSCOPIES ARE TYPICALLY RECOMMENDED AT AGE 40.
A BONE DENSITY TEST IS RECOMMENDED FOR ALL WOMEN UPON ENTERING THE MENOPAUSE AND EVERY TWO YEARS THEREAFTER.
LAB TESTS ARE RECOMMENDED ROUTINELY ON ALL PATIENTS AS DETERMINED ON AN INDIVIDUAL BASIS TAKING INTO ACCOUNT PRIOR TESTING, AGE, AND ANY ON-GOING MEDICAL PROBLEMS.
A TETANUS SHOT IS RECOMMENDED EVERY 10 YEARS.
THE FLU SHOT IS RECOMMENDED FOR ALL PATIENTS AGE 50 AND UP YEARLY.
THE PNEUMONIA SHOT IS RECOMMENDED FOR EVERYONE OVER THE AGE OF 65 AND ALSO FOR INDIVIDUALS WITH MEDICAL CONDITIONS SUCH AS ASTHMA, EMPHYSEMA, DIABETES, AND HEART DISEASE. A BOOSTER IS GIVEN 6 YEARS AFTER THE ORIGINAL PNEUMONIA SHOT IF IT IS GIVEN PRIOR TO 75 YEARS OF AGE.
OUR CURRENT WAIT TO BECOME A NEW PATIENT IS BETWEEN 3 TO 4 WEEKS. OUR FIRST APPOINTMENT WITH YOU IS A PHYSICAL EXAM. THIS IS SO THAT WHEN FUTURE PROBLEMS ARISE, WE HAVE YOUR FIRST WELL VISIT TO COMPARE YOUR NEW ILLNESS TO. WE DO OCCASIONALLY MAKE EXCEPTIONS TO THIS RULE, HOWEVER IT IS ON A CASE-BY-CASE BASIS.
OUR PRACTICE IS CONTINUALLY GROWING BECAUSE OF YOU. THE BEST COMPLIMENT THAT YOU CAN GIVE US IS REFERRAL OF YOUR FRIENDS AND LOVED ONES. THANKS TO YOU, WE HAVE RECEIVED MANY COMPLIMENTS!
CALL US TODAY FOR YOUR ANNUAL EXAM. REMEMBER, PREVENTION STARTS WITH YOU.