Children’s Primary Care Medical Group

I’m rating this clinic as three stars but rate our pediatrician Dr. Mortimer as FIVE stars. The clinic administration is poorly ran. They are either completely disorganized or double booking every appointment. The minimum wait time for my child to be seen by the MD is 30 minutes AFTER the scheduled appointment time. And we have waited even longer, one visit was close to an hour wait. As an administrator in a medical clinic it is beyond frustrating to witness these extensive wait times, especially when the patients are all children. We continue to come to this clinic because we adore Dr. Mortimer and the care she provides. It’s unfortunate she doesn’t have better support staff to improve the overall experience. I highly recommend Dr. Mortimer, but if long wait times make you cringe, find a pediatrician elsewhere.

I’m so grateful that my son is under the care of Dr. Mortimer. She is kind, playful, informative and a wonderful physician! MyChart gives me the opportunity to message her in between doctor visits and I appreciate that Dr. Mortimer responds in a timely manner.
I work in healthcare and can attest that the long waits are not due to the staff. It’s the patients and their parents. Because parents run late and/​or ask a lot of questions it can cause the whole schedule to run behind. How many of us really come in at the check in time? I know I don’t! I’m usually rushing in right at appt time. Earlier check in time gives the medical assistant/​LVN time to take the patient’s height/​weight and vitals so you can have your full 20 min dedicated doctor time.
Look, I’m not saying that you should not address your child’s concerns, but know that if you forget to mention something, you can always use MyChart as a platform. Please be respectful of everyone’s time. We’re all exhausted and short tempered parents trying to get in and out of there.

EXTREMELY LONG WAITS !! Even worse if you have to call to make an appt — expect to be sitting on hold for at least 20 minutes, usually longer. Office waits are upwards of 45 minutes to 1 hour, which is ridiculous since they supposedly give you an appointment time! Take your business elsewhere!

Dr. Mortimer is amazing! She is patient, informative and always pleasant. I want a Dr. who gives sound medical advice and support, and who is genuinely concerned about my children’s health and well being. Dr. Mortimer is just that. AND MORE. Not only does she thoroughly address our medical concerns, but she also makes sure my children are eating and doing well socially, mentally at home and at school. She is always so pleasant every time we see her, and is great at putting the children at ease. Children usually don’t like doctors, but both my children adore her. She is really truly amazing!
In all the years we’ve seen her, I can only remember feeling SLIGHTLY rushed ONCE, and that wasn’t even her fault; she was spending most of the time addressing my child’s issue of the day, and I forgot to ask her my questions until she was about to leave. At all other appointments, she always took the time to answer our concerns — even when we were her last appointment and most other staff has already left because it was way past their working hours!
And yes, as some others have mentioned, the wait to see her at some appointments can be long, but it is not anything unusual compared to any other doctor’s office. I’ve waited much longer for much less competent doctors, dentists, nurses… only to have them see us for barely 5 minutes before running out the door. Some of them don’t even stay for 5 minutes. My mom had an eye surgeon who — after waiting for almost 2 hours in the lobby and exam room — saw her for all but 30 seconds under poor lighting before deciding (based on the disconnected evaluations of his 4 residents) that my mom needed a hole lasered into her eye. So it’s normally hard to justify waiting forever only to be seen for a few minutes. I mean, what do they do with all that time?! Fortunately, with Dr. Mortimer, I know exactly what she does with all her time — CARING FOR US * HER PATIENTS. I feel that it’s only reasonable for us to wait while she give others the same level of care that we’d want her to give us. I feel every minute waiting for her is a minute she’d give to me or another who needs it. She is amazing and absolutely WORTH THE WAIT.
As many of her other patients stated, I’d gladly wait and follow her around wherever she goes — as long as it’s drivable, I’m there =)
In fact, that’s exactly what we did. We actually started seeing her at the Mira Mesa office. But then she moved to poway, and I moved my children with her, even though it meant a much longer drive since we still lived in Mira Mesa at the time.

My daughter has been going to this office for two years now. There is ALWAYS a wait time of over an hour. I try to make her appointments after 3:00 since I work full time. I’m told the wait time gets longer as the day goes on, but I have no choice, I have to work. My last appointment was at 3:30. The doctor finally saw us at 4:45 and we left the office a little after 5:00. This was just for a well child visit. No shots, just weight and measurements.

Very happy with the staff and Dr. Lindback. Had an appointment within 12 hours. Very clean and good equipment. Attentive and courteous nurse and doctor. Knowledgable and well prepared.

I have been taking my children to the Poway location for many years. The doctors are wonderful, if you don’t mind waiting an eternity to see one. Every time one of my children have an appointment, it has been a minimum of 45 to an hour wait to see a doctor. This is the wait time with an appointment. I normally just wait because as we all know when you have a sick child, they need to be seen. I have complained once before to the office manager and her solution was to pass me off to another office that wasn’t as busy in 4S Ranch. She wanted me to drive further in order to wait less time. That was her solution. She basically didn’t care. Today was the last straw that broke the camels back. My daughter had an appointment at 4pm. I was on time. We waited 20 minutes and then were led back to the exam room. The nurse said we were next and that the doctor would be with us in 10 minutes or less. We waited and waited and waited. After an additional 35 minutes (55 minutes total), I finally came out to see where the doctor was. I saw no nurses or doctors. I waited for the receptionist and asked her where the doctor was. She had no idea, or answer, nothing!!! I am not an impatient person. i realize I will have to wait at times, but an hour is unacceptable. No one even came in to update us as too why the doctor was not coming in. At least they could have informed us that she was running far behind. Instead, we were forgotten about in the exam room. I finally told the receptionist that this appointment was a complete waste of my time and that like the doctors, my time was valuable too. I also told her i better not receive a bill for the wasted time. If anything, i should send them a bill for my time and gas. I will look for a new doctors office for my two children. This office has no respect for their patients. They over book appointments they can’t handle the volume of patients.

If my kids were able to get sick Monday-​Friday, I would give five stars. Dr. Page and Dr. Sullivan are awesome! great with kids, super responsive and accessible. I also love that you can walk in first thing in the morning. Weekend experience, not so hot. My daughter had a sore throat and fever on a Saturday morning. Drove to the affiliated urgent care that we had been previously referred to use in PQ, and had good experiences. They were closed (offices in Otay Lakes and La Mesa were open; not helpful as I live in North County) Called the office. Robot said to call 4S Ranch office which opened at 8. I decided to just drive there because it was just as easy as driving home at that point. Nobody there. Locked doors. Mine was the only car in the parking lot. Called the office. Took three calls and 45 minutes to get a human and schedule an appointment. Doctor was on his or her way at 8:45. Of course by that point, I was back home, and now I am driving back. Three stars might be a little too hard based on all of my positive experiences during weekdays, but they seriously need to tighten up the weekend protocol. Figured a 1 for the weekend and 5 for the weekdays= 3 stars

Our two girls have been seeing mainly Dr. Herring ever since we moved to San Diego. I believe our 3 year old saw Dr. Bowers once. Both of them are great.
Even though they are extremely busy, Dr. Herring and staff take the time to answer any questions we might have. The MA that we always have is amazing. She’s patient with the girls, especially the rowdy 3 year old.
I give the front desk staff a medal for not snapping at all of us crazy parents. I have worked in medical offices for over 15 years and I think that pediatrics has to be the most difficult. Think about it… they are always busy and they are often on the receiving end of upset parents’ rants about their children. Nope, you couldn’t pay me a million bucks to do what these girls are doing.
On Thursday, the hubs took our 3 year old in for a follow up visit (seasonal allergies) and the office was swamped. It took a bit until they took them back to a room, but once in there, the MA brought the girls some coloring pages to occupy their time. It was a little gesture, but super sweet.
We’ve done a walk-​in appt. once, which I wasn’t a huge fan of. I totally appreciate that they offer walk-​ins, but there was some confusion about who got to go see the doctor first, which was a little irritating.
That being said, they totally made up for it the other day. I had scheduled an appt, for my 3 year old through MyChart (LOVES), but they only had appointments for about 2 weeks out. I wasn’t too worried about it, but asked if I could be put on a cancellation list to try and get in sooner. The day after I scheduled it, a woman from the office called and offered me an appt. the very next day!

I’ve only had my daughter here, sick, once before… Strep throat. She’s 11. Other than that, she’s never been sick. I took her to Urgent Care the other day for a horrible rash that was gone by the time they saw her. «Allergic reaction.» But she’s now got a swollen lymph node… Infection? I was going to wait til the end of my visit to post a review… But yeah… Not waiting! My daughter’s appt was at 11:00. It’s now 40 minutes later & I was told at 11:25, «you’re next.» I’m missing work, have a ton of errands to run, and I’m sitting in a room full of sick, snotty, coughing kids. We can’t go on the «well child» side because my kid HAD a rash! I will definitely be finding my daughter a new doctor!

The nurse practioner at this office is HORRIBLE god forbid you disagree or ask any type of questioning as to why snotty and old and needs to retire asap… but dr lindbeck is awesome and changed my mind about switching drs again payed attention to all my questions and helped with the weight issues were having. The staff is 50 50 some look cold and just bored the others were very sweet to my daughter.

Trying to get ahold of anyone of this location via phone is like trying to get ahold of the president… Impossible!!!

I love this office! The doctors are fantastic and the staff are very friendly and professional. We switched from Sharp and referred to Dr. Sullivan in this office. We have no regrets. He really cares about our (3) kids and explains things in a way we can understand. The kids love him and look forward to seeing him and the nurses. I love the online My chart and we always get a quick response from the doctor and staff. We are so happy with our switch to this office.

I still love the doctors at this location, but honestly, it takes forever to get someone on the phone for an appointment! I wait on hold for at least 10 – 15 minutes, which is unacceptable. And wait times in the office have increased by a lot, too. I wish they were as quick as they were few years ago. Not sure if it’s because they are busier? But they need to get their act together.

We have been seeing Dr Herring and Dr Barr for several years now. They used to have a small office, just the two of them down the street from where they are now. Their staff was always nice and friendly, the receptionist recognized us when we walked through the door, and the wait times were decent most of the time.
Fast forward to now, they have moved to a larger office, there are several Dr.‘s in the office the front office staff seem miserable, they never smile and act as if they are doing you a favor just being there. I dread having to call and make an appointment, it usually takes 20 minutes to get anyone on the phone. The last time my littlest one was sick, I sat on hold for 15 minutes, ended up hanging up and headed down to the Minute Clinic where we were in and out of there with our script for antibiotics for the ear infection I knew my child had in about the same amount of time I sat on hold and never even got to talk to anyone, never mind try and get an appointment that day. Oh, and the Minute Clinic is cheaper too!
Since they have combined offices I always have billing issues, and god help you if you need to call over to the billing office with questions or to get something straighted out. They give you the biggest run around, one time they billed me for shots that my son never got and wanted to argue with me about the charge on the bill. No joke, every single time my kids have to go to that office I can guarantee that I will be on the phone with billing within the next couple weeks when the bill comes, we do have insurance but for some reason they manage to screw up the coding or charge us for things that were never done. I’m over it, it’s time for 5yo school shots and I’m off to find a new Dr to get it done!

I want to first say that the pediatrician I use for my children, Dr. Barr, is great however the staff and medical group need much improving. I have two toddler boys who don’t have much of an attention span. There waiting room has no toys to entertain small children. Not that big of a deal except the waiting time is long.
The office staff is cold and unwelcoming. There is a feeling of disconnect from your doctor because everything is set up much like an assembly line. It’s hard to get a hold of a receptionist when you need to cancel or schedule an appointment.
Although I like the doctor I use, I feel the medical staff are deal breakers.

Here’s my most recent experience, and I’ll preface by saying I first started using this group of doctors when my son was born and have loved them until now. I started at the Mission Valley location next to Rady’s Hospital and transferred to the location off Pomerado only because it is a much closer drive. My 6 month old daughter came down with what looked like a virus, low-​grade temp, lack of appetite, etc. After 4 days, she seemed to be getting worse, so I took her in and they told me she just had a virus and I needed to wait a couple more days (even though she had no congestion, cough, or other signs of a cold). The doc told me if I waited two days and she still had a temp to bring her back in and they’d check for a UTI. That night she had her worst night of all and I was even on the phone with an ER nurse late that night to see if I should take her to the ER. I was back at the doc the next morning and because I was doing the sick-​child walk-​in appt had to see a different doc than the one I saw the day before. He also believed that my baby just had a virus and was going to send me back home, until I begged him to do a urine test since the doctor the day before had promised that was what they would do if I came back. After telling me how unreliable the results of a bag urine test was on an infant and how painful a catheter is which was our only other option, he finally agreed that in order to put my mind at ease we could do the bag test. Of course the test came back positive for a UTI! Then he informed me that we would need to do a catheter to collect a larger quantity of ‘cleaner’ urine to send to the lab. The two nurses that did the first catheter were more interested in talking to each other and took so long getting everything ready that my daughter of course peed all over the table before they could get the catheter in. They still did the catheter to see if her bladder had anything left and surprise it didn’t! So I had to get my daughter calmed down, waited until she was hungry and was back 2 hours later so they could do the catheter again. The second group of nurses barely got enough in the cup to send to the lab because I honestly believe they had never done a catheter on an infant before then. The doc sent me home with antibiotic and told me we’d need to wait for lab results which take 3 days so we’d know for sure whether we had her on the right antibiotic and to determine what further testing would need to be done (ultrasound on her kidney’s, etc.) to make sure she is healthy and that this won’t occur again once the antibiotics are stopped. Although her fever went away after a day on the antibiotic, she was extremely fussy and almost unconsolable, so much that I called the doctor on Friday to see if they had lab results yet, no luck. On Saturday I was on the phone again with the ER nurse to once again see if I should bring her in because she was obviously having extreme pain or discomfort. The nurse even called the on-​call doc at the Pomerado location so she could check to see if lab results were in yet since we didn’t know what to do next without seeing those results. The lab results were still not in Saturday. Thankfully my daughter finally had a much better night on Saturday and Sunday seemed almost normal and today is even better. At noon on Monday I still hadn’t heard from the doctor about the lab results so I called and was told a doctor would call me when they were done seeing patients. Monday at 6pm I finally got a call, the doctor told me that my daughter’s urine never made it to the lab, they found it in the refrigerator late Monday afternoon, and because the sample is only good for 24 hours they won’t be able to send anything to the lab.
I understand people make mistakes, but this one regarding my 6 month old baby has my husband and I feeling like we can’t just shrug our shoulders and continue to trust our kids in their care. Especially since in a couple weeks I’m supposed to take my daughter back for her 6 month check-​up. After all we went through does it sound crazy that I’m scared to trust that they’ll give her the right shots!?! My husband made a good point… why did it take until Monday night for someone to notice the lab sample still sitting there??? It sat there from Wed afternoon till Monday night? If someone would have called us on Thursday or even Friday and told us about the mistake I think it would be much easier to trust the staff and workflows that are in place at this location. Still haven’t decided for sure if we’ll continue to take our kids here…
Good luck in your doctor search! I truly appreciate doctors and nurses and I realize they see a lot of kids and moms everyday, none the less when it’s your turn to see them you always trust that they’ll listen and provide you with the best care possible.

Love the doctors! They have been great. It’s the whole customer service and trying to reach someone that’s a pain in the butt. I’ve been on hold every time I call, for a minimum of 10 minutes and that’s just calling in and pressing the numbers to get a live person. And when you show up, the girls act like they are doing nothing. Kind of frustrating. I’ve complained in person about this issue twice and it doesn’t help. We were going to the Poway location, so I tried to call the Mira Mesa location to see if any better… twice and on hold once for 5 minutes, then another for over 6 minutes… Sorry Dr.‘s Herring, Barr and the rest… staff makes a huge difference and answering the phones would be a good start. We have just located another practice and are transferring our son.