Morningside Pediatrics

Dr. DiMundo has been our pediatrician for the last 6 years and I love, love, love her and her staff. I have referred several friends to her, who also see her. Yes, oftentimes you have to wait, but when you are the one whose child is sick, things take a little longer than expected and everything gets backed up. I could probably see one of the other doctors and by-​pass the wait, but I prefer to wait for Dr. D — she is so knowledgeable, intelligent, down to earth, compassionate and pragmatic. I totally trust her and know she always has my kids’ best interest at heart.
I have seen at least 3 of the other doctors at the practice and they’ve all been good, but they can’t replace Dr. D for me.
As for billing, I’ve never had any serious issues in the time we’ve been going there. It’s a busy practice, but I think they do a great job of keeping the ship running well!

Working with Morningside Pediatrics has been such a frustrating endeavor. Complaints:
1. INSURANCE: They’ll say they accept your insurance, won’t tell you if they actually don’t accept it, and then send you bills for hundreds to thousands of dollars months later if your insurance isn’t in their network to begin with. Would be nice to know up-​front, right?
2. TESTING SERVICES: Our son has been through three rounds of antibiotics with Morningside, because their in-​house strep-​throat test has indicated positive each time he’s gone in. When we got the fourth positive result (in a six month span) due to a cold he was having, my wife insisted that the result be sent out to a professional lab for verification. What do we find out? Our son tests positive for all minor strep-​tests due to certain anti-​bodies, but in reality, doesn’t have strep throat and has to have the more professional test administered. I don’t mind this mistake happening the first time, but you would think better protocols would be in place by test #2? And it was my wife who insisted on further testing, as Morningside was perfectly fine with pumping our son up full of antibiotics.
3. SCHOOL REPORT: We asked Morningside to fill out a school health form, for our son’s preschool, considering he’s been to Morningside about 4 times in the last 6 weeks. Their response? Nope, we had to come in and purchase another appointment that was not going to be covered by insurance (the funny thing is that they still say it will be covered, when I know perfectly well I’ll get a bill in a month for the full price).
The one compliment I’ll give is that they outsource an emergency number line to a call center ran by nurses in Ohio — those ladies have been great.
Otherwise, in regard to Morningside, it’s lousy medicine and terrible billing. This has been a god-​awful experience for us. We are now sending our son to Paracelsus in Pasadena, ran by Dr Simon Barker — been a terrific experience so far!
Thank you all for reading — Miguel

Dr. DiMundo was my son’s pediatrician from birth to 3 years. We’re now moving to Portland and are so sad to say goodbye! She is incredibly knowledgeable with fantastic bedside manner. My son has developmental delays and she guided me through the process of getting therapies through the regional center. She’s always kept on top of his issues and likes to stay informed of his progress. The office staff has always been incredibly helpful, as well. My questions and requests have never gone unanswered. Thank you for a great three years, Dr. DiMundo!

UNPROFESSIONAL & A LETDOWN. We selected Dr. Dimundo as our pediatrician based on a friend’s recommendation plus that she spoke Spanish. However she failed to show up at the hospital on our baby’s birth and failed to notify us. Instead her colleague arrives and says Dr. Dimundo is on vacation and offers no apologies she couldn’t make it. I called their office & asked if Dr. Dimundo was on vacation and was told she was NOT on vacation and was there at the office. Thanks Dr Dimundo and Mornigside for lying to your new patient, so professional. The next day the same colleague shows up again, and again no apologies Dr. Dimundo couldn’t make it. Making matters worse, the colleague had a lousy bedsde manner, was completely unhelpful & acted like a recent med school grad. Basically all the qualities you look for in your new pediatrician when your baby’s born.
The next day we switched to a pediatrician we had met previously and really loved at PACIFIC OCEAN PEDIATRICS and told her what happened. She came to our rescue at the hospital within 2 hours and saved the day. We love her, she is awesome and so have all our successive visits to Pacific Ocean Pediatrics. They’re AMAZING!

Unfortunately, I have to drop one star from my initial review. While my wife and I still think Dr. Ben-​Artzi is amazing and would give her 5 stars, I have to take away a star from Morningside Pediatrics as a whole. We had a scheduled appointment to take our daughter in for a follow up booster for her flu shot, yet when we arrived, we were told the clinic was out of pediatric flu shots. When we asked why we were not notified of this in advance, especially since our appointment had been on the books for more than a month, we were told someone had «coded» the visit incorrectly, so they failed to note in the system that we would be in for a flu booster. So we wasted time and gas on our one-​hour-​round-​trip for nothing. This mistake was not the fault of Dr. Ben-​Artzi, so we don’t blame her and plan to keep her as our daughter’s pediatrician, but we are very disappointed with the staff of Morningside Pediatrics. We don’t appreciate having our time wasted. If we had missed the appointment, I’m certain the clinic would have charged us a fee, yet they did not offer us anything for our wasted time and gas, and we’ll have to waste even more time and gas to make another trip to the clinic when they actually have the flu booster in stock.

Dr. Caitlin Colvard is the best! One of the most informative, knowledgeable and caring doctors I have ever met. Our newborn son is a patient of hers, and she has gone above and beyond for him, and for us! She’s developed an amazing connection with him, and does a thorough evaluation and recap of each visit during and after to make sure all our questions are answered. Simply put, a rising star within pediatrics, and someone we highly recommend!

Dr Jenna Roberts is THE BEST! So sweet and great with our newborn. She answers emails at all hours of the day and night — even weekends! Could not have a more glowing review for her work!

Dr Nguyen is our newborn’s pediatrician. She is kind, caring and patient with us a new parents. Dr. Nguyen is very knowledgeable and explains things throughly. We are very happy with her as our doctor and would highly recommend her. We have also seen Dr Dimundo who is also very nice.

I really wanted to remain with UCLA group, but employer doesn’t contribute jack for adding my baby to my plan.
The place was a little outdated, but nothing intolerable. My first visit was for my baby’s 2 month check up and shots. They didn’t inform me about what exact shots he was given (I researched beforehand), nor did they mention anything about possible side effects to watch out for. My baby was unusually fussy that evening and I got worried so Googled it myself. Fussiness, check. It didn’t last very long, but I had peace of mind knowing it was common and would pass shortly.
Suggestion: UCLA Group provides a 3 – 4 page mini report (give or take pages depending on relevance of information) of updates on where my baby was at developmentally and it includes all of the stats/​measurements and things covered during the appointment. I miss those reports! Sooo great.
Parking:
Cost me $ 8 to park in the lot behind the brick building at the corner of 23^rd. Spaces are good sized. At 2pm there was ample availability.

We like this place. Since we moved here we had to find a pediatrician for my teenage daughter and we came here. We saw Dr. Nguyen and I really liked her. She took her time to learn to know us, talked to my daughter straight forward (not like she is a baby which she isn’t). We both felt very comfortable with her and I would recommend the office and Dr Nguyen.

I love Dr Weiss. She’s nurturing, competent and reliable. The only con is that she is part time so limited booking times, but she’s fantastic. If you need to see a dr straight away another doctor from the practice will see you and they are fantastic. I really like everything about the practice esp Dr Weiss’s MA who is absolutely wonderful with kids and very informative. A huge con about this practice is that the parking is absolutely hell and you do have to come early to park before your appt time.

In two years, we’ve seen four of the five pediatricians there. Our current doctor is Ben-​Artzi and we like her. She’s always very personable, spends enough time with my toddler and is very friendly and caring. Dr. Di Mundo did a simple procedure on our toddler and you can tell she was very experienced. Dr. Weiss wasn’t able to diagnose that the cause of our baby’s (when he was 2 months old) extreme rash on the buttocks was due to the formula that she recommended to us to use — we couldn’t figure out the cause of this constant rash until we hired a night nurse to help us. I was fairly surprised that a doctor wasn’t able to make this diagnosis and being first-​time parents, we didn’t realize this either. We had to make appts. with Dr. Nguyen a few times and I don’t think I want to see this doctor anymore. She tries to be friendly and helpful, but the last time we saw her, she told me that I was focusing too much on the issue that I brought my toddler in to see her for and discounted my worries. Sure, it might not have been anything and I might have just wasted her time, but frankly, I took my toddler in for a reason and I walked away feeling like I had wasted my time too.

Our doctors are nice and I have nothing to complain about. BUT HERE are WHY I give them 1 star rating:
1) Takes hours before they call you back for any emergency.
2) I have experienced 4 different pediatricians since I started visiting 6 months ago.
3) I requested a medical records 1 months ago, and it is still hasn’t been done, SO long?

I love Dr. DiMundo and her staff. They are kind, professional and truly care for the kids who come into their practice. She knows what she is doing and is always down to explain things in simple terms.
Another wonderful thing is how quickly she responds to after hour/​weekend calls.
Truly a class act, if you are going to be parents and live on the west side, this is a doctor you can truly trust with your kids.

I love Dr. DiMundo! She sees our 4-​month old daughter, who has had an huge number of infections and accidents for her short little life. Dr. DiMundo is very sweet and smart. She explains everything and never makes us feel like we are crazy for worrying (you have to worry, right? They are so tiny, and we have no idea what we are doing). After my baby’s first eye infection when she was just 5 days old (Staph from the hospital!), Dr. DiMundo gave us her personal cell phone and checked in with us several times over the weekend. She really cares. We also love the office (recently remodeled), and all the nurses and other doctors are also great. They have a policy that you can see any of the doctors if you can’t schedule with one, and we have seen them all. A lovely practice. I highly recommend to all my new mommy friends.

We love Dr. DiMundo: very efficient and down to earth USC trained doc, doesn’t rush through the visits or make you feel like your questions and/​or concerns are stupid or unwarranted (especially as a new parent), gives recommendations and educational advice for vaccines/​flu shots on schedule but is open to parental choice (I chose yes vaccines, but no flu shot), returns calls same day or within 2 hours after hours before 10pm and emergent calls even sooner, very clean office & waiting room with nice and mellow staff, parking in lot through driveway just east of office is validated by pharmacy if you need Rx filled. Also just added cute, artsy decorations to exam rooms!

I have been coming here for just over 6 months now. They have always been attentive and helpful when calling with any issues and I haven’t had problems getting in to see our doctor with medical issues on the same day. I see one of the newer doctors there (Dr Ben-​Artzi) and she is great with my daughter and very friendly. I encourage anyone new to the area to try them.
Parking can be a bit of a pain but there is a big paid lot behind the building that is only $ 3 or so depending on how long your visit is.

My family was very unhappy with the service Dr. Dimundo provided. She took days to return a message and does not seem to remember previous discussions (which I’m assuming are in the chart?). She is very friendly and nice– but after several small problems and then a much larger issue we did not feel comfortable trusting her with our daughters medical care. My biggest issue was the time it took for her to return a call about something that we thought was urgent — over 48 hours.

Rebecca DiMundo is hands-​down exceptional… a rarity as a physician and a human being. You will not find a more compassionate, caring, thoughtful, smart, responsive pediatrician than her. My husband and I joke that we can’t leave Santa Monica until our kids our grown, because we couldn’t ever leave Dr. DiMundo. And it’s not much of a joke, actually. She is a star on every level.

From day 1 Dr. DiMundo has treated my son with such genuine care and skill. She undoubtedly knows what she’s doing and for such a busy woman, she makes herself available for phone calls to calm my nerves about any problems or questions I have (and as a new mommy… I definitely have many!) I can’t count how many times doctors have had their receptionists or assistants call me to answer questions for them. This type of personal warmth is definitely what Dr. DiMundo is known for — it’s such an important thing for me as a new parent to have.
She expresses concerns in a way where she already has a solution for them (and she seemingly always does) so it makes me feel very comfortable that she really knows all the answers. Choosing a pediatrician is tough, and I screened about 5 of them until I got a personal reference for Dr. DiMundo. When we met her, we knew she was the only pediatrician we would trust our first born with. Her warm smile never ceases to make me feel like we’re on the right track with raising a healthy son — which she often assures that I’m doing. This is also important for me because being a first-​time-​mom is SUPER nerve-​wrecking!
We love, love, LOVE her!