How to Make the Most of Your Visit
Tell me about Harvard Vanguard Medical Associates
Harvard Vanguard Medical Associates is a multi-specialty medical group practice. We deliver comprehensive health and wellness services to a community of over 300,000 patients at 14 offices in and around metropolitan Boston. Harvard Vanguard is not a health maintenance organization (HMO) or an insurance company. Like many medical group practices today, we accept multiple insurance plans and our physicians are listed in many insurance companies’ physician directories.
The insurance plans we currently accept are:
- Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts (HMO Blue®, Blue Choice®, Blue Care Elect®, Access Blue, and indemnity plans only)
- Harvard Pilgrim Health Care
- HealthCare Value Management
- Neighborhood Health Plan
- Private Healthcare Systems
- Tufts Health Plan (HMO, PPO, POS, and EPO products)
- UniCare Classic New England PPO
- Most indemnity insurance plans
Insurance plans have different policies in which specialist physicians or services are available to you. If your insurance plan is an HMO, you are required to choose a primary care physician (PCP). In choosing a Harvard Vanguard physician for your PCP, you have also chosen the Harvard Vanguard physician network to provide your specialty healthcare needs. For certain specialty care, you may be referred to a specialist out of the Harvard Vanguard network. Exceptions are infrequent and coordinated based on medical necessity.
APPOINTMENTS
Office visits are arranged by appointment only. It is very helpful to be as specific as possible about your medical concerns when calling for an appointment. This will help the medical secretary set aside the appropriate amount of time for your appointment. In the event that your physician is not available to see you within a medically acceptable timeframe, you may be seen by another member of the clinical team that you selected (either nurse practitioner/physician assistant or a physician).
If you are having a life-threatening emergency, call 911 or your local emergency access number. If you are unsure of your medical needs, call our office number any time of day/night and you will be directed to the appropriate staff person.
Please arrive at least 10 minutes before your appointment time. This will allow time for you to complete the registration and check-in process. Our goal is to see patients at the time of their scheduled appointment, however, on occasion, there will be unavoidable delays as a result of medical emergencies.
If you arrive late for an appointment and your physician is still able to see you, please understand that your time together may be shortened so that other patients will not be kept waiting. You may elect to reschedule or wait until the end of your physician's schedule where it's possible to devote more time. Again, our goal is to make the most of you and your physician's visit together.
If you need to cancel an appointment, please call 24 hours in advance so that we may use the appointment time for another patient.