Doctor-Visit Prep

You get fifteen minutes, months apart, and you're the only witness who's seen everything. This page turns what you know into what the doctor can use. Print it, fill it in the waiting room.

Bring these three things

• The changes list: what's new or worse since last visit (below).
• Every pill and potion: prescriptions, over-the-counter, supplements. The bag itself works. Medication interactions are a top cause of sudden decline.
• Your behavior log, printed: "agitated most evenings, 4–6pm, worse after TV" is clinical gold; "she's been difficult" is not.

How to describe changes so they land

• Say when it started and how fast: "new in the last two weeks" (fast = investigate) vs. "slowly over six months" (slope = progression). This one distinction drives most of the visit.
• Compare to their own baseline: "She used to handle her own pills; now she double-doses" beats "her memory is bad."
• Frequency, not adjectives: "up 4 of the last 7 nights" beats "sleeping terribly."
• Say the hard parts out loud: the aggression, the wandering, your own exhaustion. Doctors can only treat what they hear, and if the person is present, hand a written note to the front desk to give the doctor: it spares everyone the humiliation of discussing it across them.

Questions worth your fifteen minutes

• Could anything on the medication list be making the confusion or behavior worse?
• Could this recent change be something treatable: infection, thyroid, B12, depression, pain?
• Is there anything to treat the [sleep / agitation / anxiety], and what are the trade-offs at this stage?
• What should we expect in the next six months? What would you be planning for, in our position?
• Is it time to talk about [driving / more help at home / palliative support]? Can you write your recommendation down for the family?
• Who do we call when something happens after hours: you, urgent care, or the ER?

Your changes list

Cut the phone tag: five calls that pay for themselves forever

None of these are urgent. All five save you hours of hold music later. Make them once and stop thinking about them.

• Sync every refill to one pickup date. Ask any big pharmacy to line up all your prescriptions on a single monthly pickup. It's free, and it ends the pharmacy-run treadmill. CVS calls it ScriptSync; Walgreens calls it Save a Trip Refills and enrolls by phone at 1-833-728-3874.
• Ask for multi-dose blister packaging. The pharmacy pre-sorts every pill into dated, timed tear-off packets: no more "which pill, which day." CVS offers multi-dose packaging at no charge and ships it to the door (call 1-800-753-0596); Amazon Pharmacy's PillPack does the same. Availability varies by location, so just ask: "Do you offer multi-dose packaging, or who near us does?"
• Get your own patient-portal login. Proxy access to labs, appointments, and messages beats phone tag with the front desk. If they can still consent, in MyChart it's Share My Record → Friends and Family Access. If they can't consent anymore, ask medical records for "diminished capacity proxy access" and bring the diagnosis letter. It's a standard process most families never hear about.
• Know the records deadline when an office stalls. Federal law (HIPAA Right of Access) gives them 30 days to act on a written records request: one 30-day extension allowed with written notice, and fees limited to actual costs. The sentence to say: "I'm making a written request under the HIPAA Right of Access. When within the 30 days should I expect it?"
• Book the visit so it works for you. Say "dementia" when you book and ask for a longer slot at their best hour (usually morning). Lead with your single biggest concern first, not chronologically. Hand over the one-page med list instead of reciting it.