James R Macho, MD

Dr Macho helped me with a hernia. Great doctor!

I met Dr. Macho at around 1am one evening a few weeks ago in the ER where I was admitted for acute appendicitis. I was on my feet within 12 hours of the appendectomy, out of the hospital in less than 24 hours, off painkillers completely within 72 hours, and back to high intensity weightlifting and exercise within 2 weeks. Of course, your mileage may vary, but overall I’m not sure how I could be any happier with the surgical care I received.
Dr. Macho is not a primary care physician. When someone is going to be cutting me up and literally taking my life into their hands, I’m not worried about their ability to keep an appointment for a non-​emergency consultation. If an emergency calls him away, so be it. I was that emergency. What I want is a skilled, experienced surgeon who will keep me alive, do what needs to be done, and do it with as few adverse effects as possible. As far as I am concerned, Dr. Macho fits that role perfectly.

Cannot speak highly enough of this doctor. Presented with a complicated issue which had the potential of becoming a chronic problem. Dr. Macho answered all of my questions thoroughly and really put me at ease in what was otherwise a very scary situation. Thanks to Dr. Macho’s medical brilliance and his own passion for what he does, Dr. Macho did not pursue the «standard» treatment for my issue, which I since learned would have positively left me with a chronic issue, and instead consulted with his colleagues, conducted research and pursued a different more conservative course of treatment. Thankfully after 8 weeks, what would have been a lifetime problem, is now a distant memory. You’d be lucky to stumble across a doctor half as good as this one. His nurse is awesome too.

I saw Dr. Macho for a surgical repair of a right inguinal hernia. (repaired with mesh).
Here’s my experience: He was kind, caring, and careful in explaining my diagnoses and answering all my questions. On two occasions he went out of his way to accommodate me by making time for a consultation outside of his normal hours, and then coming in to his office on his day off when I was concerned about increased pain and discomfort.
(he was concerned that the surgery had to be done urgently before the scheduled date — which turned out not to be the case).
The surgery went smoothly, without any complications. Actually, other than the obvious unavoidable incisional pain and swelling — I have had no pain and have taken no pain medications after the surgery. The incision is about two inches long and the original groin pain discomfort is completely gone.
Everything about this experience has been positive — including the warmth and kindness of his office staff who made everything accessible and easy for me.
I could not have had a better outcome or experience.
I am very grateful for the care I received from Dr. Macho.

WOW I’m so impressed by DR. Macho, i’ve never had a Dr. take care of me to the level he did. I can honestly say I would trust Dr. Macho with my life.
I saw Dr. Macho after a trip to the ER for a pretty bad abscess. The ER Dr. didn’t get it all out and I was concern. My primary physician recommended Dr. Macho and said he is the only person he would trust to take care of me. I called the office and they were able to get me in the next day. Staff was nice and I was seen without a wait. Dr. Macho had to further cut into the abscess to get it all out & had me come in the next day (he also did a culture to make sure it wasn’t MRSA even though the ER Doc. did and it came back negative, he wanted to make sure, without a doubt that it wasn’t). I had also been complaining about my eye, I thought I had a stye but my entire eye was swelling up and it was very painful. So without me knowing he called an ophthalmologist (Dr. Aguilar) in the building and asked about my eye. He came back in the room and said hurry I got you an appointment with Dr. Aguilar but he only has 10 minutes before he has to speak on a panel. I rushed upstairs saw Dr. Aguilar (Dr. Macho, stayed by my side the entire time) and he diagnosed me with a Chalazion and had to cut into it and take it out (It was painful, Dr. Macho gave me his hand to squeeze). Dr. Macho asks Dr. Aguilar if they should get it cultured «just to be safe». (He’s also thinking, double checking and asking questions). Wow that quick judgement call saved me so much time and effort and took care of an issue that could have gotten a lot worse in a matter of minutes. So impressed with both Dr. Macho & Dr. Aguilar.
I was asked to return to see Dr. Macho after the weekend. He advised he would be in the office over the weekend so if anything was wrong I could call him. Over the weekend I noticed the wound still had puss so I called the office and spoke to him and sent him a pic of it. He told me to clean it a few more times that day and if it still looked bad he could make time to see me the next day (2 days before my actual appointment). I held out and saw him today. He did a final cleaning and then asked me about a symptom he said kept popping up in his system as something he should check on (from original paperwork I filled out), he said that, that symptom can become very serious and he wanted to know more about it. I explained my experience to him and he said that he could do an exam «to be on the safe side». I agreed as I just want to get healthy he noticed a few things and wrote me a prescription. He did extra cultures to make sure it wasn’t anything more serious. The concern was something i’ve had for years and never got it checked out. So relived to have it done.
He double checks every label, asks questions to ensure you are 100% health in all areas. He is a critical care surgeon and deals with life threatening surgeries, so he is not the kind of Dr. to say lets wait it out. He wants to get everything taken care and see you at optimal health.
Dr. Macho is:
DETAIL ORIENTED
EXTREMELY THROUGH
TAKES PROPER PRECAUTIONS
STAYS ON THE SAFE SIDE
CAN TREAT ALL YOUR ALIMENTS
IS THERE FOR YOU
TRULY CARES ABOUT YOUR WELL BEING
I’m surprised that Dr. Macho got a one star from someone. I hope that doesn’t deter anyone from seeing him, he is great Dr. and surgeon. He went above and beyond his job for me and I know he would do the same for anyone else in need.
As a side note– The one star is coming from someone that has no friends on Unilocal has given 4 reviews and 3 of them are one stars. They complain that the Dr. wouldn’t give them 3 people that he’s operated on. Of course not, that goes against Dr. patient confidentiality, it’s a form we all sign when we step into a Dr. Office. Also it’s not ok to bash peoples appearances. It doesn’t matter what your Dr. looks like, what matters is can you trust him and does he do his job properly. One last thing when he does exams he has his nurse present at all times.

I was referred to Dr. Macho by a family friend. I live in the San Jose Area which makes it roughly a 1-​hour commute to his office. The morning of the visit his office called and said that he has to attend to an emergency surgery and that the appointment will be delayed for a couple hours, but they said that FOR SURE, he’ll be available early afternoon. Another call comes from his office again after we had already left San Jose and on our way to SF saying that he had another emergency to attend to and that he can still meet the same day but it will be a little latter and again this time his office said that rest assured IT IS FOR ABSOLUTE CERTAINTY (you would think from experience they would have a good gauge for this). BTW, my mother took the day off of work to drive me there (which if you’re a doctor probably isn’t a big deal, but if you’re a working-​class person going pay check-​to pay-​check IT IS). So, we decided to just continue on to SF. We hung out there for a few hours. Right as we were driving to the scheduled appointment (the 2^nd reschedule in the same day), we get another call saying that the appointment will be cancelled because he has emergencies to attend to. Why didn’t they just tell us that this was a possibility before hand? THEY ASSURED US WE WOULD BE ABLE TO SEE HIM THAT DAY, BUT THAT WE JUST WOULD HAVE TO WAIT!
SO, my mother had to take another day off of work a few days later to repeat the whole process.
Now, to add insult to injury, my household is on a quest to live healthier. We are trying to purchase a chemical free mattress without any flame retardants. This requires a doctor’s note that we pass on to the mattress company. We contacted Dr. Macho’s office after the $ 275 appointment requesting a note (not a prescription, a freakin’ NOTE!) AND THEY REJECTED IT. TALK ABOUT COURTESY?
I mentioned to his office that the family care physician’s office gave me too many hoops to just through. Now, they did the same thing. They treated me on the phone like I was asking for a prescription for some illicit drug LOL.
Now in order to get a doctor’s note, I have to specifically seek a doctor who does this and probably pay him $ 200 for a freakin’ note on top of having to pay for a mattress that is 3x more expensive than conventional ones.
To me, this demonstrates that some people just can’t relate to the average person who struggles to get by. For doctors, $ 200 for a note isn’t a big deal. That is probably the mind frame the rejection of my request came from.
EDIT 10−28−13: Dr. Macho’s office called me and my mother first thing this morning about the review I left here. It’s funny how when you leave a bad review all of a sudden the doctor becomes available to talk. Yet we had to wait 4 hours in the metered parking of SF for our delayed appointment which eventually got cancelled! When I brought this to Dr. Macho’s attention today he TOTALLY IGNORED IT (EWWW!) and proceeded to talk about how my review is discourteous. WOW! Talk about some nerve. I guess anything but treating him like GOD is a discourtesy. If Dr. Macho reads this, you’ve insulted us so much that even if you waive the charge and write the note for the chemical free mattress I still won’t remove this. So don’t waste your time, YOU WON’T BUY ME OUT.

Dr. Macho was fine. His staff on the other hand is less than helpfull.
I have left several messages for his business manager to call me regarding a billing problem, but have not received any communication at and all his reception staff can do is give her the message and this past time I called to try to resovle this matter, they were very, very unprofessional.

I made an appointment at the Hernia Center of San Francisco and got Dr. James Macho to consult with me about repairing a hernia. My first impression was not great because he looked really unhealthy and his eyelids were hanging down half covering his eyes. However, I tried not to judge and give him a chance to prove himself. At first he didn’t think what I had was a hernia, but after I showed him how I could push it in, he decided that yes, it was in fact a hernia. (Shouldn’t he know what a hernia looks and feels like?) He assured me that he was very experienced at repairing hernias, and when I asked if he could provide patient referrals, he skirted the question by directing me to his 3 positive reviews on Unilocal :-(
He scheduled me for an operation within a week, at my request. But first he insisted I come back for an EKG before the surgery. When I returned for the ‘mandatory’ EKG he informed me that he planned to do a rectal, pelvic and breast examination as well. WHAT!?! for a hernia operation??? I think NOT! He really had a strange vibe that I was not comfortable with. He said that just because I look and feel healthy, doesn’t mean that I am (?) and therefore I needed all of these other tests (???) I don’t know what his real reasons were and I don’t want to falsely accuse him of something he did not intend. But I did not feel good about his tactics and I left without doing any of his tests and cancelled my operation. I have chosen to take my business elsewhere.
I have asked others in the medical profession about this and everyone I’ve spoken to says that it just doesn’t add up to do all of these tests (except for the EKG) prior to a hernia procedure. Also, people think it’s strange that he didn’t even recognize my hernia until I convinced him. Just sayin’ Be-​aware.

I saw Dr. Macho after being admitted to St. Francis through the emergency room because of what was diagnosed to be diverticulitis. I do share the opinions below that Dr. Macho has a thorough approach and caring manner that inspires confidence. Mostly, I was so impressed that Dr. Macho recommended that I NOT have surgery, when other doctors in the hospital thought surgery likely would be needed. He predicted accurately that my symptoms would resolve. Although I was under the care of the hospitalist, and Dr. Macho could easily have given his opinion and walked away, he followed my case closely for 4 days and came to see me twice a day. His care was MUCH appreciated.

Just like most people, I am less than thrilled when I have to go to the doctor, let alone a surgeon. Dr. Macho’s office is great though. His assistants are friendly and he seems genuinely interested in taking care of your problem and getting you healthy again. Unlike some doctors, he talks you through the process before and during the procedure and answers all your questions.
The only reason I’m giving 4 stars instead of 5 is that he only sees patients on Tuesdays and Thursdays and it’s a cash/​check only office. Make sure to hit up the ATM before you go.

I can’t believe nobody’s written a review for Dr. Macho yet. Besides being a really nice person, he’s a great surgeon. I had gallstones that had been torturing me for a while and that took forever to diagnose. I was able to get an appointment with Dr. Macho immediately, and he got me in for surgery at St. Francis in SF within a week. He was really easy going, patient, explained everything and was so personable and kind. The surgery went perfectly — he managed to do it laparoscopically, and my scars are almost undetectable. Most importantly, no more horrid stomach pain! If you need surgery, definitely go see Dr. Macho.