Getting doctors' appointments same as waiting on lottery tickets

Getting doctors' appointments is becoming tougher by the day. Does it really have to be like this?

Getting up early, I started calling the helpline of a hospital at exactly 7am to get an appointment of a well reputed doctor, but failed to even get through due to the huge number of calls being placed at the same time and when I finally got a hold of them the allotted slots for the day were already filled.

Hospitals (such as Labaid, Bangladesh Specialized Hospital, Central Hospital) taking appointments for one certain doctor at a certain time seem to be becoming the norm nowadays. And they mostly take appointment bookings for a day only which get filled in seconds.

Hospitals adopted this method to avoid long waiting lists that stretch for months, but is it really efficient or is it only depriving patients of the much-needed treatment.

This is not the case with all doctors though, it is mostly for doctors who are well-reputed and see patients only a few days a week.

There is no separate system for regular patients as well, so how can people keep seeing the same doctor if they can't even get appointments as this system is arbitrary and requires sheer luck.

However, the roots of the problem are much deeper. With thousands of doctors in the country, it is funny how getting appointments has become a task!

So, why does this happen? One of the obvious reasons is the population boom in the country that has plagued all aspects of our lives.

The other not-so-obvious reason is the lack of trust in our doctors. Only the doctors who we have heard about from near ones or who have a reputation of providing good treatment are the ones deserving of our trust and money. Mind you, private healthcare is not cheap in this country. And public hospitals are not for everyone.

Trust is a heavy word and trusting someone with our most valuable asset requires some deliberation.

However, believing that only a handful of doctors are equipped to handle our ailments would only be naivete. At the same time, reports of malpractice and careless treatment are a dime a dozen.

So, to minimise risks we go with the obvious choices. The question remains, is this sustainable? Can I really depend on only a slight possibility of getting the appointment of my regular doctor during an emergency?

Or our overall healthcare system needs an overhaul?