Primary Care of Wny

My husband and I, and our two children, were patients here for years. We loved our primary (Dr. Martinke), but over the years it became near impossible to get an appointment with him and we were constantly routed to residents and PAs. We never minded seeing residents and knew that this was a teaching practice, but it went from being a reasonable balance of seeing a resident and then seeing the doctor to being a quite unreasonable balance over several years where we’d be initially examined by a med student and then see a resident and never see anyone higher than a resident.
The other thing we hated was the phone system. We’d quite literally have to carve 30 – 60 minutes out of our day just to make an appointment.
The final straw was when I was hospitalized and just saw such a wide array of residents and doctors from the practice. Literally, every visit was with someone I didn’t know and oftentimes they’d change meds/​dosages/​administration methods with no explanation why or why so frequently. I am an excellent self-​advocate and even with my many questions, I never fully understood who changed things and why. After that, we realized we needed to find a new practice.
We still miss Dr. Martinke — he was excellent, but we don’t miss the fact that we never knew who we were going to see when we were sick, if we could get an appointment when needed, and were tired of the amount of time and effort it took to get through to the office via phone.

Generally, I am a fan. Of the doctors, at least. Their phone system can suck a bag of dicks, but the doctors are good.
I was a patient here about 8 – 10 years ago, seeing Dr. Lane. She was wonderful then and she’s still good now. When we moved back to the area last year after almost 8 away, I decided to come back here again. My husband comes here too because he just goes where I tell him to go.
I hate, hate, HATE their phone system. You can call and call and get a busy signal for hours. Then spend 15 – 30 minutes on hold just to speak to someone to make an appointment. I’m NOT exaggerating. It really is that stupid insane. One time I was on hold 42 minutes!
But the doctors here are great, the nurses are good. I’ve always been able to get same day appointments when I’m sick. I have a toddler who goes to preschool 2 days a week, so I’m sick with colds/​flus/​sinus infections more than any human should be.
My husband has a chronic pain condition and the doctors have been good about treating him. A good balance of carrots and sticks. A doctor even was able to help him get a medical waiver for his work, to make his travels more comfortable. They are very reasonable and try educate patients to maintain healthy lifestyles.
If I see a PA, I generally wait less time for them to come in. The doctors here are more busy, expect a long wait for them. But I know when they do come in they give me 100% focus, so I can tolerate the long waits.
I hope they improve their phone system, but it’s sucked for a year now so I’m losing hope of that happening. They push the patient portal thing but honestly I already have 100 different login and passwords to remember, the last thing I want/​need is another one.

I wish I could give zero stars because this office is a joke. Delaware ave location could care less about their patients. Had the same dr for 15 plus years, he leaves practice and instead of them transferring me to another doctor within practice they «discharge» me and told me I’m NEVER allowed to come back! WHAT? Fine –I found a better group of doctors that actually care about helping people.

I have been a patient of one of the Dr’s in this practice for 13 years now. He joined this practice about 3 years ago. I am happy with this office because of their multiple locations and late hours.
They also have a lot of residents doctors that are working there under the physicians and can usually take you in right away if your normal Dr can’t see you. They consult with your regular physician prior to prescribing any medications and/​or ordering any tests/​procedures.
My Dr has always listened to my concerns and asked me how I am doing. I believe he truly cares about his patients.
My husband is also a patient of his and he went above and beyond to try and get his bp down to a safe level but when his methods weren’t working, he referred us right over to a specialist.
I will say their phone system can be annoying, since they are a big practice, they are very busy with patient calls. They do have a computer portal system which allows you to access your medical information and obtain test results on your own and you can also communicate with the Dr, which allows you to avoid their busy phone lines!
If you are looking for a new Dr, I would suggest this one without hesitation!

This practice doesn’t really care about patients — they are sorely lacking in compassion. I recently injured myself while in my office, although it really could have happened anywhere. When I called the office, I made the mistake of honestly answering their question when they asked where the injury happened. They refused to treat me since they don’t do worker’s comp. I called my health insurance, and the rep said that doctors are within their rights to refuse to treat worker’s comp cases, although she agreed with me that this did not count as worker’s comp. She agreed that my insurance would cover this case, and she would call Primary Care of WNY to tell them so. After speaking to her, and her supervisor, they still refused. I called and asked them to have some compassion since my insurance was covering the case. (My office HR did not want to file a worker’s comp claim since they felt it could be denied since the injury did not happen while performing work duties.) The receptionist just kept repeating that it was their policy to not handle work injuries. After I told them this was a «s****y policy,» she hung up on me, and two days later I received a letter stating that the practice was dropping me as a patient. I had to go to urgent care to get treatment.