James J Benjamin MD

Doctor Benjamin has been my primary care doctor since 1988, except for three years when I lived in Florida (2005 to 2008). I was 40 or 41 when I became a regular patient. I am over 65 now.



I was sorry to read the review concerning the writer's experience with Dr. Benjamin's staff. I have no reason to doubt anything the reviewer wrote. I have experienced a few minor problems with his staff during the last 24 years. In the majority of my interactions with Dr. Benjamin's staff, I have received good service. No one on his staff ever has been rude to me, or uncooperative.



My comments here concern my experiences with Dr. Benjamin himself, in his role as my primary doctor. In short, I have always received excellent, attentive, and effective care under Dr. Benjamin's treatment. Among other things, his care brought under control my life-long conditions of high blood pressure, elevated cholesterol, and hyperglycemia. This involved a combination of medication and lifestyle change.



I'm not saying Doctor Benjamin is a miracle worker, but my experience tells me he is a very competent doctor in his chosen field of practice. In addition, I can't remember any visit when I had to wait more than 10 minutes beyond my scheduled appointment time until I was face-to-face with Dr. Benjamin. No waiting in the office, or in the "little room", either.

My mother was a patient of Dr. Benjamin's until a few months ago. The reason she changed doctor's is because she had been sent for a few tests that included an ultrasound of her carotid artery to check for blockage. According to Dr. Benjamin, the test was fine. However, during her next visit, after listening to her heart with the stethoscope, he told her she had a heart murmur and sent her for more tests. After about two weeks, my mother called Dr. Benjamin's office to find out the results and had to leave a message. Dr. Benjamin called back and left a voice mail for her telling her that the tests were fine and he probably misheard the heart murmur during the visit. How do you mishear a heart murmur? Common sense would tell me that if I thought I heard a heart murmur, I would wait a bit, then check it again. And how can you tell someone you hear a heart murmur and scare them that way and then leave an impersonal voice mail? My mother decided to change doctors after that and when Dr. Benjamin's office received her request for medical records to be sent to her new doctor, she received a letter stating that the charge to copy medical records would include a $20 preparation fee. Maryland law states that a preparation fee may only be charged if medical records are to be sent to another doctors office. So, my mother called Dr. Benjamin's office and spoke to the receptionist, the doctor's wife Joan. My mother told Joan that she would pick the records up herself to avoid the preparation fee. Joan told my mother that whether she picked them up herself or not, she would still have to pay the fee. My mother got off the phone and double checked to be sure that we understood the law correctly. We did. My mother called the office again and explained the law to Joan. Joan's response was "If you don't pay the fee, you don't get the records". So we printed the pages from the Maryland Office of the Attorney General and the Maryland Physicians Board that showed the law in writing regarding the preparation fee and faxed them along with a letter stating if they did not contact my mother telling her when she could pick up the records and what the new amount would be, LESS the preparation fee, she would contact the OAG's office. Two weeks went by with no response, so we sent a complaint to the Office of the Attorney General. Once the OAG contacted Dr. Benjamin's office with a request to explain why they insisted on unlawfully charging the preparation fee, my mother received a new letter from his office stating the new fee for the records, without the preparation fee. When my mother showed up to pick up her records, neither Dr. Benjamin nor his mean wife were there. They had a different older woman working who is just as mean as Joan. When my mother wanted to make sure that all the records were included before paying, the woman said no. My mother asked her to count the pages to make sure that the correct number was included and she grudgingly did so. Then my mother asked her to check for a specific test and the woman rudely told her she didn't know what it would look like. All she had to do was look for the name of the test on the pages, but I suppose it was too much to expect from this office. I would recommend that people look elsewhere for a doctor. This "Christian" man and his wife do not act like people who care about their patients. I say he is a "Christian" because he is a deacon in his catholic church.