A review. Of sorts.

If you find yourself having the need for a radiology exam (a mammogram, sonogram, etc.,) may I strongly suggest you avoid, like the fucking plague, Manhattan Imaging Associates on West 17th street; an outfit on whose ass I would like to drop a little knowledge. Among other things.

Although you might not be aware of it Manhattan Imaging Associates on West 17th street (between 7th and 8th), with the exception of routine well-visit check-ups, the vast majority of people who are sent to a specialist for testing are there because their doctor needs to rule out, or diagnose and treat, a host of BIG SCARY illnesses. They are there because they have been experiencing symptoms that have given both them and their doctor cause for alarm. They are not feeling well, and are understandably worried about it. And so they may arrive at your office in a tender, vulnerable state.

Which is why, Manhattan Imaging Associates on West 17th street (212-989-8999), it is a remarkably poor decision to hire the world's two rudest bitches to man your reception desk (a patient's first stop, and their first impression of your level of care. And YOUR first opportunity to put them at ease). Women who do not say good morning or good day when you arrive, who stare at you like you have some freaking gull to be bothering them, and who demand, with the kindness of a gestapo, that you rattle off a litany of personal information about yourself for everyone in the waiting room to hear. I'm wondering, Manhattan Imaging Associates on West 17th street, why the woman ahead of me in line--the one who had to announce her name, her doctor, her insurance, and that she was there because of the appearance of a lump on her existing breast not two years after she'd lost the other breast to cancer--had to be subjected to your insulting dehumanization, your eye-rolling. Is it she, or her cancer that's such a bother?

Sadly, your nurses and technicians were no improvement. I was shoved into a group dressing room with a gown, not told what I should remove, was scolded for not removing the right things, and then scolded for removing too much. When I leaned up from my doubled over in pain position to ask the nurse to please be specific so I could get it right that time...I was asked if I had a hearing problem. I was chastised for not sitting on the examining table correctly by a woman who said nothing else during the entire exam. Except when her probes caused me to cry out in pain, at which point I was told to be quiet.

To put it plainly, certain procedures like having your boob stuck in a vice or a camera shoved up where the sun don't shine has a tendency to make a person a bit ill at ease. Particularly people who are already ill at ease due to uncertainty about their health. Which is only heightened, exponentially, by a cruelly rude staff who begin barking at you the moment you walk in the door, have no consideration for the fact that you might not want to sit half naked in a waiting room with six other people, or endure an atmosphere of cold, depersonalized attention I can only associate with a slaughter house.

In closing, a hearty fuck you Manhattan Imaging Associates on West 17th street. May you lose your business license in a well-pressed scandal, and may you rot for all eternity in hell.