When you visit Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital for your child’s pre-operative appointment, we want you to have the best experience possible. This important visit allows our team to design a custom care plan, conduct a health review, educate you on the surgery, and answer any remaining questions you may have. It’s a vital part of your child’s care that can help improve surgical results and speed up recovery times.

Preparing for the Pre-operative Appointment

A little preparation can go a long way to ensuring that this important visit goes efficiently and smoothly. Please be aware that no operation is performed at the initial consultation visit, but the child must be physically present to be evaluated.

Who Must Be Present at the Appointment

A parent or legal guardian must accompany the child to the pre-operative appointment:

• If you are a legal guardian, we will need to see the legal papers that indicate your legal guardian status.
• If you are the parent but do not have legal custody, we will need to see the legal papers that allow you to make health care decisions for your child.

In the event a legal guardian cannot accompany the child to the appointment, the person with the child at the appointment must bring a legally executed power of attorney form to the appointment (to be legally executed, the form must be signed by a legal guardian and notarized).

What to Bring

• Your insurance card
• Photo identification
• Insurance authorization
• Medical records
• Applicable co-payment is due at time of check-in.

Before the Day of Your Appointment

If your insurance requires authorization, it is your responsibility to have that forwarded to our office as soon as possible. Our fax number is 727-767-4346.

Parents/guardians are responsible for ensuring that the referring physician's records and applicable tests are sent before or present with the child at the time of the appointment.

Bring a list of prescription and non-prescription medication and vitamin supplements the child is taking, including the name, dose and instructions.

Please note that failure to have appropriate authorization will result in either rescheduling the appointment or treating the patient as a self-pay, and payment must be made at time of service. Also note that failure to have relevant medical records and x-rays may result in rescheduling of the appointment.