The most important thing you should bring to every appointment is this printable doctor’s appointment summary checklist.
Do you ever find yourself reading a magazine or checking your email on your phone in the waiting room of your doctor’s office, only to be called back to the room with your mind on something else besides the questions and concerns you came to see your doctor about?
Living with a chronic illness means lots of doctor’s appointments. And many of our conditions and medications can make our minds cloudy and hard to concentrate. Remembering all of your questions and concerns you want to address with the doctor is a challenge for many of us. Then, once you walk out of your doctor’s appointment you need to remember the feedback and plan of treatment the doctor gave you.
This printable will help you keep track of all of this important information and stay organized so that you never again forget important details of your doctor’s appointment. You can file it or keep it in a personal medical binder to refer back to in the future. It may help you recognize patterns and keep track of symptoms and medicine/treatment effectiveness.
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5 Ways this Printable for Doctor’s Appointments Can Help You Stay Organized.
1. The free printable for doctor’s appointments keeps you from losing focus when you get distracted.
So you are psyched up and focused for an important appointment you have been anticipating. It’s finally the day of the doctor’s appointment and you sit down in the waiting room and pick up a magazine. Next thing you know you are engulfed in the latest movie star gossip and before you know it your name is called to go back to the patient room. Darn it. You’ve lost your focus.
Or on the day of your doctor’s appointment, you get an email from your kid’s teacher about a behavior or academic problem. Poof! Your mind starts to focus on what the problem could be, why is this happening, what are you going to have to do to address it. Again, your focus has been hijacked.
But, if you have this free printable for doctor’s appointments you have everything you wanted to address or ask your doctor right in front of you.
2. Don’t ever forget important questions and concerns when you use this printable doctor’s appointment summary.
Brain fog is a reality for so many of us with a mental or chronic illness. Ugh! It’s so frustrating and no one around you understands. In between doctor’s appointments questions or concerns will pop into your head and if you don’t write them down in a place that you will remember (ha, we are talking about brain fog) you did, it will be hard to remember once you are sitting in front of your doctor. If you have this doctor appointment printable with you, you will be covered and you can rest assured you won’t drive home kicking yourself for forgetting to ask an important question.
Also, sometimes at doctor’s appointments emotions can run high and you find yourself reacting. Maybe the doctor gives you some surprising or negative news. Your mind is busy trying to process this new information and you lose your focus on the questions/concerns you wanted to address with your doctor. As long as you have your printable doctor’s appointment checklist, you can still regain your composure and address your questions/concerns.
3. This printable helps you remember what your doctor’s feedback and comments are from every appointment.
Even though you may be focusing on what your doctor says in response to your questions/concerns, it may be a lot to remember. Whether your fighting brain fog or you are highly emotional, it may slip out of your head the moment you walk out of the door. If you have your doctor’s appointment printable, you can write it all down during the appointment and ask for clarification from your doctor if needed.
4. You’ll never forget the plan of action and treatment plan your doctor prescribes if you have the doctor’s appointment printable with you.
At my doctor appointments, especially at my psychiatrist appointments, there are a lot of “If/Then” scenarios she gives me in regards to medication instruction or changes. She may say, take this medication for 5 days and “if” you feel good, “then” stay at that dose. But, “if” you don’t feel a difference, “then” increase the does my .25mg (insert any dosage that is probably hard to remember LOL). This is actually what causes me to create the doctor’s appointment printable. I had to have a way to remember all of this information coming at me. And especially if I am struggling with my bipolar disorder, then my head is really fuzzy and it’s hard to keep information straight.
5. The doctor’s appointment printable helps keep your medical records organized for the long-term.
By keeping records of questions/concerns, medication instructions, symptoms/side-effects and outcomes of different treatments, you will stay organized with your health information. Then in the future, if you change doctors or prescribed new medications, you have a record of what treatments/medications have worked for you (or not worked for you) in the past.
Get your FREE Doctor Appointment Printable and never forget that question you meant to ask your doctor again! You can download this free printable from my Resource Library by clicking the button below.
Some people choose to use bullet journaling for keeping track of doctors appointments. I prefer this method of using the printable doctor’s appointment summary because its uniform and you can easily stay organized and file it in a medical binder which you can take with you to future doctor’s appointments.
I am actually working on a comprehensive personal medical binder for you. It will have many sections with health history/diagnosis forms, medication history, current medication lists, hospitalizations, doctor’s appointments, symptoms and side effects chart and much more. Find out more about the Chronic Illness Medical Binder.
Read More . . .
- How to Keep Your Medications Straight + Free Medication Tracker Printable
- Daily Tips for Managing Life with Chronic Pain
- 15 Seriously Genius Chronic Illness Cleaning Hacks
P.S. Would you do me a favor and pin the Free Doctor’s Appointment Summary Printable Organization for me! I really appreciate it!
