Meed D Steven, MD

Dr. Meed is my favorite doctor because he practices medicine the right way: asking the patient questions and examining them. I couldn’t recommend him more. He has made my life so much better since I’ve been his patient — he’s confident in what he does and doesn’t blindly follow test results. During my visits, I have also found him to be a very thoughtful and patient person.

Even though it was written seven years ago, I have to agree strongly with the 2007 review on here. This rheumatologist is smart, receptive, and broad-​minded as described in the 2012 review. Unfortunately, though, none of that matters when he turns over so much responsibility to an absolutely awful physician assistant (she must have been there even 7 years ago, too) and front end staff generally. I have experienced basically the same kinds of incompetence and manipulation the other reviewer below did. In the beginning, you think you will put up with it because the doctor himself seems broader-​minded and more thoughtful than most I’ve encountered.
But in the end, when the patient has to rely on a physcian’s assistant who does not call in prescriptions to pharmacies, does not provide prescription info to the mail-​in pharmacies, does not call back other physicians about drug interactions (and dubiously mispronounces drugs when she finally does so, leaving you with some doubts!), switches your lab results with another person of the same name’s, does not provide written or call-​back lab results, promises to call you back in a few minutes and does not call you back at all, repeatedly – well, it’s endangering my health and safety. Repeatedly. (Did i say that? haha). The doctor’s attitude has always been a cheerful, «Just keep calling us!» Despite his saying that he’ll talk to you on the phone directly, he never has, with me, thanks partly to the assistants’ preventing it (and of course just not responding. At all, for days, to repeated messages).
Dr. Meed has just relocated to a new UES office where, of course, today no one at all answered my 4 calls! Nice. I have requested my medical records — three weeks ago, repeatedly, via email — and received only a couple of unsigned, half-​sensible emails telling me they have no fax and no capability to mail anything. I have requested my records so that I don’t have to return to his practice, and naturally even this last, simple step is proving impossible. I would recommend you stay away from this office if you ever expect to need a medical record, a lab result, or a prescription! Dealing with these people truly makes you feel like you’re in a Kafka story– in some sort of surreal, totalitarian state.

This doctor is smart as well as experienced. He doesn’t have an answering service because he answers the phone himself after hours. This should be fantastic… but the arrogance he exhibits because he is so smart, I guess… trickles down to the not so smart, front desk staff and office manager. I don’t know if they are afraid of him, but these «know it alls» will go to any length to make the patient look bad, rather than admit that they don’t know how to do handle something with insurance or handled something with insurance incorrectly. They are quick to tell you that the doctor knows nothing and signs whatever they put under his nose. Which is unfortunate, because they really know nothing about anything out of the ordinary, don’t listen and consequently what they put under his nose to sign is wrong and sign it, he does. They lie to the pharmacist when you are at the drugstore, then they ask to talk to you and lie about what the pharmacist just said, even though you were standing there listening. They lie about what the people on the phone at the insurance company’s presciption coverage dept have said, when you are on a conference call hearing it, firsthand. When you correct them, they tell you, you misunderstood. It is mind boggling. You know you are going to get the hell away from these people as soon as you get help with the problem you are having, but you can’t leave until you get the help with the problem you are having. It is miserable. On the first visit he told me that my insurance, in particular pays so little, he would have to get my patient history in 2 visits. I was still so thrilled that he was smart that I could overlook this. He then asked my name and said he never remembers names, when it came time to write the prescription. I have trouble with names when I meet a group of people. But when I am in a room with one person for 15 mins. and I have papers in my hand with the person’s name on it, I know the person’s name, at least for the moment. He doesn’t know your name because your name is not relevant to him. But again, I was so thrilled that he was smart, that I overlooked this. By the third visit you are seeing the physician assistant who is young and is clearly not the rheumatologist with many years of experience, whom you came to see. He sticks his head in near the end of the appointment and asks if he can join. He is in the room for 5 mins. max. Oddly, he never touches the patient at any time during 3 appointments and keeps his hands in his pockets unless he is writing. Is the patient dirty or germy or perhaps sick? It’s quite the slick money making machine with the slickest little liars at the front desk. Now it’s getting harder to overlook. One day, a patient is going to get hurt and no matter how facile the front desk staff is at lying, he’ll end up getting sued, if he hasn’t already. It truly is a shame when the ego of the doctor eclipses his intelligence and experience. There’s an underlying ugliness to this arrogance, that he manages to disguise initially, but just barely. He is visibly disappointed when he discovers you picked him off the insurance list and weren’t referred to him by someone who thinks he is fantastic… even though you, in that moment, feel so grateful to have found him. Initially, because there are so many doctors out there who are arrogant and stupid, you are willing to tolerate his arrogance because he is smart. But couple his arrogance with the antics of the office staff and it is all so distasteful that you are now sick in a way you weren’t, when you began.