After waiting in the crowded Omni Clinic reception area for almost 3 hours, I was received by a Physician's Assistant. I had an open wound on my foot which I believed to be infected, the symptoms being extreme pain when I put pressure on my foot, and swelling in the area of the wound. The young PA glanced at my foot and said she needed to consult the doctor but her diagnosis was that there was no infection. She had barely touched my foot or put any pressure on the area around the wound.

Dr. DiRuggiero than entered the exam room, after I waited another 1/2 hr, took a glance at my foot, laughed at me and told me there was nothing wrong and go home and soak it if it made me feel better. This experience start to finish took about 4 hrs with approximately 10 minutes being spent on any sort of diagnosis. But the story doesn't end here.

The next morning I woke with with a severally swollen foot, and almost unable to put any pressure on it at all. It was clear that the infection had become more severe. I went back to Omni Clinic, encountered another crowded reception area, explained to the staff that I had just been there the day before and after waiting almost 3 hrs for my appointment, was sent away with an obvious misdiagnosis. I asked for consideration to be seen quickly as I was in a lot of pain. I was told that was not possible as there was only one physician on duty, and therefore, I waited for approximately 2.5 hrs. This day resulted in an examination by another doctor who was thorough and responsible, resulting in the diagnosis that I did have an infection which required an immediate Tetanus shot, and the need to be on antibiotics for 10 days. Within 3 days of the medication I felt better and I am grateful to Dr. Wang for his thorough examination.

I believe Dr. DiRuggiero unfortunately was trying hard to manage a crowded reception room by passing patients through as quickly as possible and relying perhaps irresponsibly too much on his young, inexperienced physician's assistant's diagnosis. It is a shame that he did not spend the addition 5 minutes it would have taken to put on a pair of medical gloves and conduct a more thorough examination himself. This misdiagnosis cost me time and additional money as insult was added to injury when I got my bill and saw that I was being charged for the two visits. I called the office and respectively asked to have the first visit expense waived. I called multiple times, asked to speak to Dr. DiRuggiero who never returned my calls, I just kept getting bills for the two office visits, which I am forced to pay to ensure no damage to my credit history.