Ideal Option Addiction Medicine Program

Ideal is exploiting those who live on the lowest rung of society and their Medicaid cards. That's all who comes to the local clinic. All these Suboxone clinics sprang up in biggest part by the Medicaid expansion act and the opioid overdose crisis. The tax debt ceiling congress recently enacted all but gutted human service programs. The state will be re-evaluating existing Medicaid cases to determine continued eligibility for this domestic program.
Contrary to the for profit medical propaganda splayed across the web there is a stigma rolled right in clinic. You will be on Suboxone the rest of your life. You will be physically dependent on the bupeprenorphine. The program claims they free addicts from their addictions but you will be swapping drug for drug as you will be hooked on the much more addictive Suboxone.

I gave someone a ride to Ideal Option's Corvallis Oregon facility recently...They called the police on me...long story short...I am sitting in my truck waiting to learn if she had been accepted and the next thing you know there are cops with guns drawn asking me to show my hands and exit the vehicle. They created a very dangerous situation for no reason. The gal was delusional & paranoid (thought I was going to sell her to sex traffickers). Calling the police on someone bringing a person to their facility...Not a smart way to do business and a sy thing to do personally.
The police said the facility called it in as if I was out in the parking lot beating on her and threatening her with a gun (i did have my gun on me... registered, stored properly, & unloaded )which was not the case. Luckily for me the Corvallis police responded with Professionalism & Restraint (shout out to police officer Ryan Bell) and I was not forced to prostrate myself (face first on the asphalt). I was not humiliated further by the placement of handcuffs, nor was I beaten...much to the dismay of the caller who, no doubt, wanted the police to teach me a lesson. (Me=disabled veteran (service connected), former firefighter, nurse (BSN), alcoholic in recovery since Nov 17th 2002).

I wanted to share my first week with Ideal Options. I had been seeing a private Dr and felt that I was starting to need a better treatment plan. My dr was amazing but for myself I'd wanted a bit more counseling option that didn't seem to be available without inpatient in my area so I thought I was blessed that Ideal Options took walk ins & same day visits. Their website looked like what I was hoping for. Wow, I was in for rude awakening! Due to lapse in appt (my fault) I was actually off my suboxone for 3 days when I went in. The young dr I was seen by was a caring new hire there and seemed to really want to help me step down on my dose without causing me distress. I was excited and felt like I was on my way to where I wanted to be. The Nurse assistant was really cool and did explain that my prescription would be faxed over within "a few hours". I figured I'd made it 3 days so a couple hours would not be too hard. Well that was my first rude awakening on how the clinic is ran. I was seen at 9:45am and by 6pm rolled around I'd started tracking down what was going on. It was only then that I was informed my prescription would take 24 hours...up to 1pm that next day. Well, not being too patient when I'm in withdrawals I continued to stay in contact with the call center. Finally by 8:45pm I was able to pick up my 6 (yes enough to get me to my next appt morning) suboxone.
I check in at my 10:45am appointment only to see standing room only waiting room full of patients who was already waiting at least hour+ for their appointment. After a 2 hour wait I was taken back to a bare room with a computer screen in it. Yep...Telemed for addiction. Impersonal. The Dr was nice enough but I felt uncomfortable because I was supposed to see the previous Dr I'd first met to discuss adjusting doses (my main reason for switching to IA). So I get home and start the Guessing Game & Bug The Pharmacy game. I will not be treated like a number & a cash out by a cattle call money making place. I do want to say the front desk ladies are amazing and great at their jobs but to have a crunch of people in such close range of seeing my personal information is too close for comfort. And the topper on all this is I'm supposed to jump the hoops twice a week now! I spoke with a gentleman today who hadn't had any relapses and still must go twice a week after 7 months. Nope, this isn't the place they advertise on their website. And whats sad is the business first started with amazing intentions but I think greed took over.

Ideal Options sounded like a dream come true. My daughter is a 24 year old heroin addict and we have spent thousands on suboxone prescriptions and provider fees. The clinic in Vancouver, WA sees Medicaid patients free of charge so my daughter made an appt as soon as she found out we had an Ideal Options nearby. Unfortunately, the place is a joke. It takes days to get your prescription and when you do get it, they start you off at a ridiculously low dose that barely takes the edge off the withdrawals. Two weeks in a row my daughter had an appointment on Thursday, expected her rx to be ready on Friday, still waiting Monday morning. It was my understanding that a government funded facility had to have counseling available but my daughter has seen a counselor one time in the last three months. It’s so frustrating to see so many careless mistakes made when these mistakes could be deadly. Put an addict in withdrawal by taking away their meds and you’re going to cause relapses. Relapses lead to overdoses and overdoses to death.

I was the 9th patient EVER at my Ideal Options clinic in Everett, Wa.
That was in Nov 2016 and after a couple months of having to come in twice a week, I eventually, "Graduated," to every other Tuesday.
Sometimes I get my prescription called in the same day as my appointment, and sometimes the next day
And, yes, I have had to call after still waiting after the 24 hours to find out of there was a problem, but, most of all, I have been able to stay clean and sober with their help for almost two years now!
Now I'm hearing people say they only have to have an appointment once a month and I'm wondering why I've never been offered that option!
I've never missed an appointment, never failed a U/A, and, I'm going on two years on November 5th.
If anyone qualifies for once a month visits, I should.
That's my only, "concern," lol other than that, I can't complain!

This company came in and took over the practice I'd been visiting for the last 14 months or so, and things changed very quickly. I'd been on monthly visits for the last year, was told to come in every other week, despite the 3 hour round-trip, cost of gas, taking a day off work etc. No problem, I put in my dues, was switched back to monthly after my 5th or 6th visit, went and picked up a 2-week prescription the following day.

Called the office to make them aware of the mistake...the lady on the phone spoke to me as if I was lying. She didn't bother to ask anyone about the mix-up, didn't look at my file, nothing at all. The receptionist picked up, I told her about the mistake, and she shot right back, "If you want your medication, you need to be here in two weeks.". PERIOD, I'm not even joking or exaggerating.
I was a bother, a nuisance that needed to be dealt with so she could move on.

Needless to say, I was ticked after having to call-out for work and spend my afternoon dealing with what she could have dealt with if she'd even pretended to have an interest in helping.
I had to start scheduling my appointments for early in the week after they'd forget to call in my prescription. Its only happened twice in the last 7-8 months I've been there, but since they're closed on Friday, finding out that they forgot to call in your prescription means going for three days without meds...which, you really can't ask for a more perfect setup to relapsing.

There's a couple different examples I could give of literally TRYING to get these people to give a sh**, and coming up short. This is an awful business, I've been clean for going on two years and still having to deal with occasional pressure from them to go back to a bi-monthly visit.
Last month it was about my prescription, the milligrams, the medication was too powerful, I needed to come in twice a month on account of "The DEA really cracking down on us". What? This month, the practitioner didn't even remember saying that, said everything looks fine.
My guess is that there's some pressure coming from the top, being exerted over the practitioners here and there to get the numbers up. I don't know, but I sure miss the provider that these guys took over for.

Don't get me wrong, this treatment could very well save your life, and I'd bet on that, but this operation looks like a money-making machine where the care for the patient is much farther down the list than the care for the most expedient route to profitville.

I've been on this program two week and they stay allow 24 hours to get ur medicine. I am serious about my treatment and have followed directions and I have to drive 45 minutes to get to a pharmacy. Today I am without medicine at all. It's been two days since my appointment. I am simply trying to get my problem resolved I left a message saying something wasn't working for the pharmacy and was treated ruder than I am accustomed to being spoken to by some young girl named Alexandria. She refused to put me through to talk to their prescription team I was told he is too busy to talk to me I began to tell her what I knew to be the problem and she cut me off, I finally got her name it's Alexandria. She told me my prescription was called in this morning which isn't true. I talked to the pharmacy and called back and was hung up on. I then called back and magically the prescription person answered, when I told him what the pharmacy specifically told me he argued with me and I simply told him I'm serious about my treatment and am without my medication and he said after pleading about not feeling well that he would call them back. I left a message a few hours ago for him and he called the pharmacy and never bothered to call me back. It's stupid that they be allowed to treat patients this way it's not as if my insurance is not being billed a great sum of money to be provided services through them. He basically said if he couldn't figure out how to resolve this I will have to wait till Monday. Horrible, horrible customer service. I wasn't angry when I called just merely concerned and they don't call you back to let you know. The phone service persons name was Alexandria she refused to give me a name of a supervisor and told me to file it online. She said they were too busy to let me talk to the right person and didn't even listen to me when I tried to tell her what my problem was.

This is one of the most poorly ran addiction medicine clinics. There is no doctor in the clinic. The provider is incompetent and had no background in addiction medicine. Each time I was required to give labs and each time my insurance was charged. Often times I didn’t even get lab results because they are ran by the company and won’t give results. The owners, who are also doctors have money in the labs. They are where they make all their money. The exploit insurances while having their executive management monkeys running around. Stay away from this clinic! Many family practice doctors will do exactly what they are doing. They’ll be covered by insurance and actually care about you as a person.

Hooked on government drugs..

Ideal Options are not ideal and they offer zero options other than their one size fits all cookie cutter approach to addiction. They recently took over my old addiction doctors private practice and things have never been worse. Their prices are double what I was paying, & the insist on seeing me twice as often. That is a HUGE increase to what I was paying. The “doctor” isn’t even in the same state as you talk to him over a phone app similar to skype. Lastly, their “wait 24 hour for your prescription” policy is a joke. It’s more like 30 hours and normally involves several phone calls to the clinic to find out what happened to my prescription.
If you like being treated like a lower class citizen, being stressed about your prescription, and paying insane amounts of money for “treatment” then “Ideal” Options is for you.

Not Ideal for anyone! They must have paid these people that wrote anything good. These people bought the place I was going to before. That place was great by the way! Integra in WA. I have had three visits that average 1.5 hours at Ideal Option (the name is so very inappropriate)! They use video visits and the MA and Doc are not there with you. It's incredibly impersonal! They try to get you to come n every two weeks, which is NOT normal and completely unnecessary. What, so you can sit in front of a monitor and answer the same list of survey questions? They don't have counseling. They make you wait 24 hours for you prescription to be called in. But worse- on my second apt. the NP told me my 1st UA one month earlier had been positive for codeine. SO first, if I was going to use, it would not be codeine. Second, why didn't they call me and make me come back or tell me? They were just setting up office, and it was a mess. I remember my UA sitting on the counter with others. Somebody had to have switched it looking back. I am clean and sober, active in AA, and I did not relapse. The guy seemed to believe me, said I must have eaten a poppy seed muffin, and we went on with business. He said if it came back positive again I would get a call. I said it wouldn't, and it did not. Today I had my 3rd visit. Clean UA, by the way. A NP finally came on the screen after I had been there an hour. He started to tell me how if you relapse there you have to come in every two weeks. I said great, I didn't relapse. He proceeded to tell me that my UA 3 months ago, OK 3MONTHS AGO, was positive for meth and opiates! WHAT! No it wasn't. MINE WASN'T! Now I am not court ordered and I won't get in trouble if I relapse, but I didn't! I was offended and angry. Why didn't someone call me and let me come in and take another one? Why did they see me for my second visit last month, if that was positive like that for meth ad opiates, and not tell me and give me 30 day supply? Why did that NP a month ago tell me it was codeine, and this NP today tell me it was meth and opiates? And now this NP tells me I relapsed and I have to come in every two weeks. I was furious! WOW< if you want a place to push you back to relapse, please by all means go to Ideal Option. Because that is how stressed out they are making me. Now no, I did not relapse. Not then and not now. But trust me I am on the hunt for a new doctor. What a bunch of frickin is! I have requested my medical records, and UA's. I want to figure out what happened. Someone had to have switched mine when they were sitting on the counter. Because mine was not positive. SO fair warning people. If I had legal issues, I would be in trouble right now, when I did not use drugs or alcohol, and I have not used for 14 months. I go to AA as part of my own recovery, and would really like to get off this stuff. I do not like being subject to this kind of treatment with no choice because I have to have this medication right now. I will find a different doctor. I will get to the bottom of this as well, and I will take legal action if there is anything I can do. I am angry! I think a better name for this place would be WORST CHOICE, or BAD IDEA or better yet NO OTHER OPTION. I'm just sayin'... Enter at your own risk!

I thought this was the "ideal option" for me.I am a business professional who finally said enough is enough. I wanted help without checking in to a rehab. I also did not want to go to a "one size fits all" approached clinic, nor did I want to stand in line for my meds every morning at some clinic. I wanted therapy and meds to help my withdrawal. Well absolutely no therapy here. You get your Subs and that"s it. The girls at the front desk are very disengaged from their patients.I tried the first few visits to be upbeat and friendly . They just treat you like another "junkie".The "doctor" who is their is not a doctor he's a nurse.My first visit I had to see a doctor over the computer. It all was very weird. They have messed up on my meds and pharmacy location.You have to wait 24 hours even as a regular patient to get your refills.They give you only enough to get to your next appointment. So the next day you are out because they never call them in within 24 hours.I could have dealt with all these little hiccups if the staff seemed to give a crap about their patients.Sad thing is I believe the staff in Kennewick are awesome. I had to see them over the computer once because the "Doctor" who is in my states location was sick. ($400 later because insurance wont cover Telemed).
They were like night and day compared to the Caldwell Staff.I am currently learning that there are a lot of normal family practice Doctors who can help with addiction. You don't have to go to a clinic like this. Just call around, google and do your home work. I will never allow my self to be treated this way again at a facility. They are very condescending. They do not treat each case as a different human being .

I am not a patient here but have contact with a lot of the patients in the Great Falls MT area. This place is poorly run, understaffed, and just does video chat for doctor visits. They do not individualize care as they claim on their website, it is a one-size fits all approach. They make money off of Medicaid and court mandated patients who fail drug tests by making them come back for more drug tests! All the Medicaid funds they receive flow right out of Montana and into Washington. I know there is a doctor shortage in Montana, but this is ridiculous and has to be a huge drain on the state's resources. And they more or less assume all of their patients are on Medicaid, even when they aren't. They do not provide ANY counseling services in-house but try to force you to see a separate provider for them (or tell you Medicaid will pay, without realizing you don't even have it). Its called Ideal option, but it should be called Only option. It is far from ideal. Maybe there are better run offices out there or maybe some of these positive reviewers are paid or had no other option and made the most of this one, but I wouldn't send a stray dog here.

I can't recommend these guys enough. Compassionate, patient, and very friendly. They never made me feel ashamed about the situation. Outstanding staff, easy to work with, and let's face it, they saved my life.

The people here are not professional at all. No privacy of information in the waiting room, ssn's and other confident info spurted out full volume. I went there for a year and a half, weaned MYSELF, down to two mg's when I picked up my prescription it was for one week instead of two. No one discussed this with me, nobody called me. The way they told me was when I picked up my prescription it was for half of what it should have been. On top of all that the counsellors are arrogant, ignorant, self righteous jerks. I'm a busy guy especially now with school starting. So I should stop all the progress I've made to come and listen to how we can't drink coffee or go pee during counseling. So I left. Best decision I ever made. Sick for awhile but WORTH IT. After a year and a half of problems with this place I finally feel like a human again.

Just to jot down a few words about Ideal Options and the service as well as the environment. Since coming to this facility I have experienced very positive outlook on my day to day life and see nothing but positive to come in the future due to Ideal Options. The staff is great and truly helpful. Unlike alot of other places the staff listens ,cares and trys to relate to you. I look forward to continueing treatment and attending Ideal Options. I would highly recommend this facility than any other.

This program has turned my life around. I'm very thankful for everything the staff at ideal option has done to help me turn my life around and stay on the right track.

I went with my son to his appointment last Wednesday(w/Dr. [redacted],MD.) after he found out he had lost his job/insurance. These guys are real folk! Going out of there way to help, what a breath of fresh air and a blessing to meet such authentic medical professionals. I had to hold back tears of joy when [redacted] explained how they would take care of my son. Instantly I could feel his spirit begin to soar again. Thank you so...[redacted].

Hello I am a current patient with Ideal Option Clinic in Tri-City's. I had a very severe heroin addiction for almost 5 years not mentioning the prior pills I was addicted to such as morphine,Oxycontin, Vicodin and just about any pain killers available. I ended up as a heroine addict that could barley get up on my feet I was hurting so bad finally I gave up. I joined the Suboxone program 8 weeks ago, now I am getting my life back and I thank God for the good people such as Dr.[redacted] that is helping me get my life back together. Thanks

I have been going here for a while now and they are all really great they help instead of judge and are really there to help u get better and reach your goals even when nobody else thinks u can beat your addiction they are there to help and support you and have been really good help and im glad they have a spokane office ...