# Anybody get a house call from a doctor? **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [March 26, 2014, 2:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anybody-get-a-house-call-from-a-doctor/684575 "2014-03-26T02:07:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![installLSC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/54ee81/32.png) [@installLSC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/installLSC)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2014, 2:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anybody-get-a-house-call-from-a-doctor/684575/1 "2014-03-26T02:07:05Z")
The days when doctors routinely made house calls are long gone. Has anyone on the board have a doctor drop by their house to check on a patient? And if you have, would you have preferred a house call or going to the doctors’ office? ---
**Author:** ![Daylate](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9dc877/32.png) [@Daylate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Daylate)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2014, 2:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anybody-get-a-house-call-from-a-doctor/684575/2 "2014-03-26T02:10:09Z")
Yes, I have had a doctor come to where I lived, with me as a patient. Did this many times. This was back in 1936 when I managed to get double pneumonia. On a farm three miles from town. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2014, 2:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anybody-get-a-house-call-from-a-doctor/684575/3 "2014-03-26T02:16:41Z")
Our doctor paid me a house call when I was a kid. I had done something to my leg and couldn’t walk. My father wasn’t very happy, and later tried to prove that I could walk (he thought I was exaggerating), but it was truly painful. This was back in the 1960s. House calls were getting to be very rare things b y that time. ---
**Author:** ![USCDiver](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/uscdiver/32/354_2.png) [@USCDiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/USCDiver)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2014, 2:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anybody-get-a-house-call-from-a-doctor/684575/4 "2014-03-26T02:30:37Z")
There’s an outfit based in the Raleigh-Durham area called, fittingly enough, [Doctors Making Housecalls](http://www.doctorsmakinghousecalls.com). ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2014, 2:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anybody-get-a-house-call-from-a-doctor/684575/5 "2014-03-26T02:35:57Z")
Not as a patient, but I work with home doctors all the time. I’m a home health nurse! 😃 There are at least a dozen companies in my city, probably more. Hundreds of home visiting doctors. Medicare pays for it for people who meet homebound requirements. Not that they can’t leave ever, but that a medical condition or disability makes it so that they require a “considerable taxing effort” or it’s unsafe for them to leave home, so they only go out for, like, church and birthday parties. There are home podiatrists, too. Medicare pays for them for homebound people with diabetes only. Stupid rule. You can be in an iron lung with disgusting fungusy toenails an inch thick and I have to tell you to go to a clinic for a foot doctor if you want it covered by Medicare but you don’t have diabetes. But a patient with perfectly healthy feet can have a foot doctor come trim their toenails at home if they have diabetes. There are home phlebotomists and lab specimen picker-uppers and ultrasound techs, too. I can even get you a chest x-ray on your couch, but the quality of the image is kinda bad and you might have to go in for a follow-up if they can’t get a good enough picture. ---
**Author:** ![jabiru](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/bbce88/32.png) [@jabiru](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jabiru)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2014, 2:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anybody-get-a-house-call-from-a-doctor/684575/6 "2014-03-26T02:37:00Z")
You probably meant this question to be answered only by US members but I thought I’d chime in anyway. My husband is disabled and never visits the GP. The GP does house calls and visits as often as needed (sometimes not for several months, other times he can call by weekly.) He was here yesterday to give 'flu and pneumonia injections. ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2014, 5:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anybody-get-a-house-call-from-a-doctor/684575/7 "2014-03-26T05:20:18Z")
I had at least one house call from a doctor in the early 1960s but haven’t even heard of them since then. ---
**Author:** ![thelurkinghorror](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7c8e57/32.png) [@thelurkinghorror](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thelurkinghorror)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2014, 5:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anybody-get-a-house-call-from-a-doctor/684575/8 "2014-03-26T05:32:26Z")
I freebase 2-3 apples a day to prevent this. I never had a house call and I can’t remember if any of my peers did. The practice was dead by then but I knew of the practice, hence the idiom makes sense to me, but maybe not to the next generation. ---
**Author:** ![LouisB](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/dfb087/32.png) [@LouisB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LouisB)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2014, 8:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anybody-get-a-house-call-from-a-doctor/684575/9 "2014-03-26T08:13:41Z")
I had a house call from a doctor back in 1958. I managed to contract a case of food poisoning for lack of a better name and there wasn’t any chance of driving to an ER. My all time favorite dermatologist gave me his home phone number and his cell phone number and told me he would make a house call if I needed it. Not many like him anymore. ---
**Author:** ![Sahirrnee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sahirrnee/32/13937_2.png) [@Sahirrnee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sahirrnee)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2014, 11:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anybody-get-a-house-call-from-a-doctor/684575/10 "2014-03-26T11:28:56Z")
Once that I remember when I was a kid. I don’t know what was wrong but I do remember getting a shot in the butt. ---
**Author:** ![AK84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@AK84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AK84)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2014, 12:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anybody-get-a-house-call-from-a-doctor/684575/11 "2014-03-26T12:49:39Z")
Yes. There is a medical practice near my parents place which does housecalls for elderly patients. My parents use it for my grandmother. ---
**Author:** ![elbows](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/b3f665/32.png) [@elbows](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elbows)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2014, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anybody-get-a-house-call-from-a-doctor/684575/12 "2014-03-26T12:55:47Z")
We spent 6 yrs caring for a stroke surviving, paralyzed and bedridden, loved one in our home. Her Dr routinely came to our home to see her, give her flue shots, check on things we reported, (cellulitis, colds, changes in her condition), even coming to pronounce her dead, when she passed. And in those last 10wks the Dr made numerous visits! Residing in Canada, (that frightening socialist country), her medical care, meds, home care assistance, visiting nurses and Drs visits, were all covered by her universal health care and her provincial seniors benefits. (Oh the horror!) so we never had to pay out of pocket for any of it. (Anyone concerned about the expense of such an entitlement culture, needs to sit down and do the math. All the assistance we received was far, FAR, below the cost of full time care, for her, for six years! Seems like the very kind of financial efficiency that conservatives should admire, to me.) ---
**Author:** ![Filbert](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/filbert/32/3433_2.png) [@Filbert](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Filbert)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2014, 2:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anybody-get-a-house-call-from-a-doctor/684575/13 "2014-03-26T14:36:41Z")
Not in the US, in the UK, but yes, I got a home visit from my GP when I did my back in - and got told off for not calling for one earlier. I just had to say I was having trouble walking well enough to get there, and I got a visit a few hours later. ---
**Author:** ![ZPG\_Zealot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/e47c2d/32.png) [@ZPG\_Zealot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZPG_Zealot)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2014, 3:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anybody-get-a-house-call-from-a-doctor/684575/14 "2014-03-26T15:14:34Z")
Rather frequently when I was in the former Yugoslavia. Of course, I could pay in dollars. I not sure they would have extended such courtesies to someone who only had local currencies. ---
**Author:** ![picunurse](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/7bcc69/32.png) [@picunurse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/picunurse)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2014, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anybody-get-a-house-call-from-a-doctor/684575/15 "2014-03-26T15:20:47Z")
Only when it was a booty call. 😃 Actually, my in-laws’ doc makes house calls with them. The office is directly across the street, so she will sometimes drop by on her way home. ---
**Author:** ![enipla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/54ee81/32.png) [@enipla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/enipla)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2014, 3:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anybody-get-a-house-call-from-a-doctor/684575/16 "2014-03-26T15:21:04Z")
Last year a Doctor paid a house call to my mom so she could get her Medical Marijuana license. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2014, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anybody-get-a-house-call-from-a-doctor/684575/17 "2014-03-26T17:50:26Z")
The doctor still came by when I was a kid in the 50s (maybe when I had the measles) ---
**Author:** ![The\_Second\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bbe5ce/32.png) [@The\_Second\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Second_Stone)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2014, 5:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anybody-get-a-house-call-from-a-doctor/684575/18 "2014-03-26T17:59:31Z")
In the 60s and 1970 our doctor still made house calls. He had been our family doctor for 3 generations. I loved that old man. ---
**Author:** ![Dendarii\_Dame](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/bbce88/32.png) [@Dendarii\_Dame](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dendarii_Dame)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2014, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anybody-get-a-house-call-from-a-doctor/684575/19 "2014-03-26T18:35:28Z")
Once, when I was little. Early 1970’s, at the latest. ---
**Author:** ![Colophon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f05b48/32.png) [@Colophon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colophon)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2014, 9:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anybody-get-a-house-call-from-a-doctor/684575/20 "2014-03-26T21:36:31Z")
I had a doctor come out to my house while I was at university. I had a fever you could fry eggs with, couldn’t get out of bed without my legs buckling under me, and thought I had malaria or something (I’d been to Africa a month or so before). He took a brief look at me and basically said “You’ve got flu. Man up.” ☹ [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anybody-get-a-house-call-from-a-doctor/684575.md?page=2)