Tahoe Forest Hospital

We went into ER with our 6 year old who broke his leg. They got us in immediately, took X-​rays, casted him, and took more X-​rays in under than 1hr 30 min. They were incredibly nice and made this unfortunate experience a little less painful.

I’ve lived in Truckee for a while now and was fortunate enough to not have to go to the hospital until this past week.
I unfortunately started to suffer from a miscarriage and had to go in twice in a weekend to get my blood drawn to check my levels. During the week you can register at the entrance. EVERYONE was so nice that day. From the girl who went above and beyond laminating my insurance cards to the lovely woman who drew my blood.
Now on Sunday’s you have to go into the ER to register. It was a little busy (not incredibly busy, I’ve seen busy ER’s and that was not one) I was told I should go home and come back later because I would have to wait a long time. This is after being asked ‘is this an emergency?’ And telling the older woman (who I’m guessing is the manager of registration) that yes, this is emergent.
She still didn’t care and told me I could wait but it would be a very long time. So I left because at this time my blood was boiling. I came back two hours later and went up to the registration desk to be greeted by Sara. The rude woman from two hours prior sees me from behind her desk in another room and comes out. I ask her, are you still really busy? She says ‘yes we are’ I then sat down, told Sara that I am having a miscarriage and I didn’t want to waste the ER’s time and I just wanted to get my blood drawn so I could see the results on a piece of paper. The incredibly rude woman looked so guilty and just walked back to her desk and never apologized.
Sara, thank you for your compassion. You and the woman who took my blood were the only reason I made it through that visit and the ONLY reason for 3 stars.
To the woman with the glasses, I never got your name but maybe next time someone tells you it is emergent that they get registered and get their blood drawn you take them seriously and maybe have half the compassion of Sara. You made my hellish weekend THAT much worse.
So, if you’re dealing with something that personal I sure hope that none of you ever have to deal with that woman. Everyone else seems to be very lovely.

it’s been a while since my unexpected visit to the ER in truckee, but I wanted to make sure to give you some kudos!
I was visiting my sister this past summer (late), and while preparing a meal on my 2^nd night there, and STUPIDLY using a steak knife to assist me in opening a wine bottle, my sister and mom ended up dragging my sorry ass here!
This ER is BEAUTIFUL! Actually, the whole facility is gorgeous! And CLEAN CLEAN CLEAN!
Best part tho, the whole visit from start to finish (and 8 stitches later) was about an hour! INCREDIBLE!
The bonus… there was one person in the ER in front of me… and she had a 7″ long splinter IN HER FOOT that I got to witness being EXTRACTED from her foot! THAT made the copay SO worth it!!! LOL!!! that was CRAZY!

Okay… not one of those places you choose to visit. We were impressed with the friendliness of staff, professionalism of the nurses, technicians and of course the physicians. Only complaint was the one of the intake people always staring at his phone — I think he was watching a basketball game.
Thanks for fixing us up. Hope to never see you again but if we have to, glad you are there!

Sadly, I came upon this hospital under some unfortunate circumstances. I was rushed to the ER after severely dislocating my ankle and fracturing my fibula during a race up at Squaw valley.
But the staff was awesome, they made me feel very at ease and were very attentive to me the whole time. They had to sedate me to set my ankle back in place and calmly explained the entire process to me. They were able to patch me up temporarily so I could fly back home and be treated there, rather than keeping me in an unfamiliar location for longer than I’d like to be.
The staff again, was amazing, and I really could not be more grateful for their care. I have since had surgery to repair the ankle and leg and have been on the road to recovery since.

Just spent the past week at this fantastic facility. Super clean, all they want to do is help out their patients. You don’t get any better than Dr. Cooper and ICU nurse Barbi. World class facility in a small mountain town!

Great ER staff, kind and attentive nurses.
Hospital staff is great too.
Went to the ER with difficulty breathing ended up i had pneumonia. Was admitted to the hospital and stayed a few days. Nurses and Dr’s were great in explaining everything going on and making sure i was comfortable. All staff were great and they have the best hospital food I’ve ever had; it was like it was made just for me.

The doctors and nurses in this hospital are great!
That being said the billing department is the worst I have ever experienced.
Tahoe Forest chooses to use a system that creates a new account for a patient each time they receive a service or are seen. Tahoe Forest sends bills out before insurance pays with out noting they have billed your insurance. Then the hospital moves your payments or overages to wherever they see fit, regardless of date or insurance status. And then you are billed a ‘summary’ not specifying what they are billing you for. Knowing where your money is going or how much was paid by insurance is almost impossible.
Dealing with medical bills and health issues is one thing, having to go to war with rude billing representatives just to pay a bill or find out where your refund is, is not necessary. At all cost I would avoid this hospital due to the billing department and Liza alone.
Liza in the billing department was especially unhelpful, and rude. I was calling to make sure I pay what is due and that I am refunded what is due to me. Liza was immediately defensive and argumentative, picking a fight at every opportunity. Instead of explaining the antiquated system the hospital chooses to keep using, and why my refund was transferred to another account.

Great team of professionals. Fast, caring and kind. Also, very cute dr!:) that was a bonus!

There was no wait on a Wednesday night when we brought my father in. We were on a spring ski vacation and far from home. The ER staff was compassionate, patient, very skilled, and personable. They discovered that my father had a heart attack (not classically symptomatic) and helped make it less frightening while quickly running tests, assessing him, and treating him. They transferred him later that night to Renown Medical center in Reno where he has been receiving excellent continuing care, for his complex case. Thank you so much. Billy was a pleasure to work with as well as the doctors and nurses.

On our vacation to the mountains we showed up clearly asking for albuterol. We said it’s not an emergency, the doctors agreed it wasn’t an emergency, we just needed albuterol because we left ours at home and didn’t have a script we could fill.
We realized we’d be paying the ER fee to fill albuterol, oh well.
We’re just asking for albuterol, they listen to his lungs, fill a nebulizer, hand it to us to administer it, listen to his lungs and send us off with some albuterol. They say they estimated the cost to $ 700 bucks, if we pay now it’s 30% off. We get out of there for $ 490. Expensive lesson to make sure we travel with albuterol. But all is well.
They get 5 stars: *****
2 months later we get billed for twice the amount described to us in the ER as the estimated cost. So we owe another $ 700.
We feel that we were pressured to pay cash on an estimate to get a 30% discount, and were misled into thinking the estimate was reasonably accurate to what the actual total cost would be.
So take off a star for that: ****
Part of what brought the bill up was something that was coded as «respiratory service.» The only thing that would qualify as being billed as that would be to have a nurse fill up a nebulizer with a vial of albuterol. Ridiculous fee for something so simple and not needed. I was kindly told by Jacquelin in billing that I should have declined the service. Oh, ok, right… I was supposed to know that the service was even being ordered? Nobody told me about it or gave me the opportunity to decline a service that was not needed and ridiculously expensive. Gee, I wonder why they didn’t take the time to explain that to me? Hmmm.
So take off a star for that: ***
Oh but fear not dear patient/​customer, we will make good on the 30% off you’re entitled to.
Oh, right, that 30% off that was conveniently not mentioned on the bill that was requiring I promptly pay in full?
So forgetting to account for that on the bill costs you another star: **
But the icing on the cake is that Jacquelin laughed at me when I requested I get it in writing that paying 70% on the bill would count as payment in full. Oh yeah, hilarious that I’m a little defensive after what I’ve seen so far of your billing ethics.
So that leaves just one star: *
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OK, look I get it that the penniless and uninsured drive up the costs and force hospitals into predatory billing so that they can get over compensated by insurers and stay in business, thus driving up everybody’s premiums. I get it, it’s the same old story about America’s broken medical system, etc. I get it. But there needs to be more advocacy for the uninsured who can afford to pay their bills and want to. Billing filling a nebulizer at $ 666 and not explaining that to us is predatory and aggro, and we’re not some faceless insurer. We’re real people who care about our credit score. Hospitals need to treat people who pay out of pocket better than this. It should be communicated to the health professionals to go easy on us and keep things within the bounds of reason. Yes we should have been insured, and we are now, but there are times when normal people fall through the cracks and hospitals need to be kinder to us and try to make sure the bills correlate with the real world.

Nobody wants to visit an ER and it can be scary. My son fell very ill to the extent to could be life threatening so you have high expectations and standards when you walk in. From the moment we came in there was tremendous concern, plenty of staffing and high competency. As an organization athey have been wonderful. Thank you!

I had an ER visit about 16 months ago, my stomach ached, I was tired all the time, my appetite had changed dramatically and I had headaches… the most painful jabbing headaches of my life. With very little to work with, and quickly deducing I didn’t have a flu virus, the physician was able to make the first and most important diagnosis of this terrifying time in my life: liver failure.
In the coming week I spent hours working with much of the staff of this hospital in an outpatient setting, trying to uncover the cause. They ran test after test but my liver continued to fail. Finally after realizing that my liver enzymes were in the danger zone and my blood was unable to clot… they hospitalized me here.
While being nearly the most terrifying experience of my life, the stay was actually otherwise quite comfortable. I can’t say enough about the staff. The night nurses and techs who came in to draw blood were so sweet, so empathetic. And believe it or not the food was actually REALLY good! I also felt as though the physicians and nurses on staff were really trying their best to give me the best advice. And that turned out to be that their hospital wasn’t equipped to handle the severity and complexity of my case.
Instead of sending me off with a letter of referral and a wave goodbye, they set me up with a local gastroenterologist, Dr Gerald Shaffer, who had connections in San Francisco. He reached out to CPMC and ensured that I would be seen by the best, that a room would be ready and waiting, and that all available notes on my case would be sent over. He continued to send me letters inquiring me about my status months after I left his care.
In a world where medicine continues to feel more and more impersonal, my experience here was anything but. Granted, it all comes at a pretty steep price (even with insurance. Ouch) but when you’re facing your own mortality… It all kinda becomes superfluous.
My liver is still bum. But it’s slowly slowwwwwly getting better. And that’s in part to the stellar work the staff here does every month I visit them for check ups. I feel pretty lucky that our tiny town has this little gem.

This is a review is for the ER
We were visiting Truckee for vacation. 6yr old daughter experienced breathing difficulties right after recovering from a nasty upper respiratory infection few days earlier, so decided to take her to the ER at this hospital. Intake was quick, and fortunately there was a spare bed for them to take my girl in quickly so no wait time other than me signing some release forms.
I was astounded that from intake to discharge was about 1.5 hour or so (typical ER visits in the bay area is like 5−6hrs minimum, with 30−50min between nurse and doctor visits/​checkups). Wait time between nurses taking vitals, taking history, etc and the doctor showing up was just minutes. When the x-​ray was ordered, she was whisked away on the gourney within 10min (again, if it were most bay are ER, you can expect to wait between order of x-​ray to actual x-​ray being anywhere from 30−60min or longer). We left with an antibiotics prescription for pneumonia and within 2 days, my girl was her normal self (with some coughing, but no fever, no distress).
Receptionist was friendly, no-​fuss. Nurses and the doctor were also very friendly and comforting. There were about 10 curtained-​off areas within a small-​ish ER room with murmur of conversation. but other than knowing that the beds were occupied and some were being treated for something, we never saw any other patient being treated. So given the space constraints, not bad in terms of privacy.
I can imagne this place getting very busy during high ski season for trauma (broken bones, concussions, etc), but thanks (?) to no rain/​snow CA winter, it was quiet which we counted our blessings.
Once you know where it is, signs to ER entrance was well marked if you’re driving once you pull into the main entrance. One downside was that there were no parking so we had to find street parking.
Overall a pleasant experience. and FAST.

Best hospital I’ve ever been in. Buddy broke his wrist snowboarding so we took him here. Cool people, let us take pictures, and had him sign the broken wrist wall of fame. Highly recommend this hospital.

We have done every thing we can to pay this hospital. It is the only medical facility in our area. The service while you are being treated is Awesome!
BUT BEWARE WHEN IT COMES TO THEIR BILLING PRACTICES ALL THEY WANT TO DO IS CONFUSE YOU AND SCREW UP YOUR CREDIT.
We have been paying the hospital for several years and every year we have to fit with them because for each visit they open up an new account. We are paying them over $ 200 per month.
The have put us to collection even though we have been paying consistently for the last 5 years.
I agree with the other review there rates are very high.
As community we continue to approve measures to help the hospital… especially since we are a Travel destination! But they do nothing to help the locals or the community out in return.
SO BEWARE!

Three weeks ago my son broke his collar bone skiing at Alpine… Tahoe Forest Hospital has been wonderful. The triage nurse was very nice and got him right in without asking questions about insurance, and how he was going to pay (he is 19 and currently without health insurance). The nurses were all very nice and immediately tended to him. The doctor was friendly and competent. The woman helping with his medical application (thank you Jennifer Hernandez!) was especially helpful.

Having been Tahoe residents for 15 years, our family has had (more) than our share of health crises. After three ER visits, one hospitalization, and one outpatient procedure,
Tahoe Forest is off our list of acceptable options for healthcare after witnessing a general level of lassitude, incompetence, and malpractice-​worthy potential. Many residents, when the topic is broached, have similar stories, usually told in hushed tones since the hospital is a major local employer.

If you break your clavicle doing stupid downhill mountain biking in the middle of nowhere, on hidden-​locals-​only trails, up on the North Shore of Lake Tahoe, this is def the place to go to get cleaned up and get some nice strong painkillers. I literally walked in and was seen within 5 minutes. AWESOME! Hats off to all the staff who were friendly, professional and managed to make a painful experience into a happy one :)
Especially the Canadian nurse, you know who you are !!! Lol.

Absolutely wonderful place to either work or be worked on. I currently am part of the pharmacy staff for a clinical rotation for grad school and love the work environment for all its quirks and charms. The docs, nurses and entire staff are clearly grateful for their jobs but also very operate at a very high competency and consistency. I worked with a doc today who spent tons of time trying to convince a patient’s wife to keep the patient in the hospital for life-​threatening disease. No shortcuts or short tempers, she was remarkable human about it all and didn’t cut corners. The level of care anyone will get, no matter the department, is outstanding, and personable, which in my opinion, just makes care that much more effective.
But the more Unilocalable part of this facility is its impressive cafeteria/​café/​lunchroom. The food is majorly cheap, as in, you can get a very well-​made pastrami-​on-​rye sandwich for less than $ 4, and veggie sides for less than a buck. The selection is huge drink-​wise and salad-​wise, and the cooks concoct stuff for you on the spot, with delightful customer service.
On top of that, coffee drinks are complimentary. They have different beverages to choose from, such as caramel macchiato, hot cocoa, chocolate hazelnut coffee and others. Awesome! I guess this is why the entire TFH staff can talk a mile a minute between the hours of 9am-​2pm!