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Doctor question: Can you simply ask and pay for a certain test?

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You are all forgetting he bought an ILX and was trying to make everyone in the Garage jealous.

Not exactly the sharpest knife in the drawer.

Anyways getting back to the point, I get people like this all the time. They see some shit online and think they have a brain tumor because of a little headache they have. Chances are its nothing, but he hasnt said what any of his symptoms are. Find a competent GP/FM doc and go from there.

Going to a imaging place may or may not work, they will usually say that a script for a procedure is needed before taking place, unless they want to assume liability for your care. There may or may not be lab tests involved before doing a CT, depending on the type involved. Even then, the radiologist would only describe what he sees, it may or may not be anything. It would be a neurologist call after that.
 
MRI, yeah good chance you can just pay and they do it. Some places really push a "full body scan" that rarely is asked for by docs or paid by insurance, its tax for the paranoid.
 
BarkingGhostar said:
Getting the MRI is one thing, getting it interpreted by a competent radiologist without a downstream GP, neurologist, etc. may present problems in understanding the MRI.
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Not to mention skipping directly to one of the more expensive test is stupid. The OP's symptoms may, or may not, warrant such. The clinical pathway that leads to certain diagnostics have many decision steps along the way.
 
Apple Of Sodom said:
Find a private medical imaging facility - one of those places that just does outpatient imaging. Let them know you are willing to pay cash and ask for the radiologist to write the order for you.

Source: I work in the medical imaging field.

And yes, an MR Brain w/ and w/o Contrast should run you about $2k. But if you are private pay they might reduce it. I know of a place that reduces it down to 30 percent for private pay ($600 or so.)
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Don't you still need a doctor to look at the results and make sense of them?
 
Ksyder said:
check out privatemdlabs.com

I ordered a few tests online, went to a labcorp in my area, they drew blood and a couple days later the results were emailed to me.

It should be easy to find a coupon code as well.
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Oh sweet. STD tests are on sale!

My favourite part of this website is that it has "Add to wishlist" as an option. Reminds of me Steam.
 
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JMapleton said:
Does that price include the cost of having a doctor examine the results and give a conclusion?
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Generally, yes. At smaller imaging centers it normally will. At hospitals and other places where the radiologist is contracted there is usually a fee for the read. An MRI should be around $200 for a read.
 
bignateyk said:
Don't you still need a doctor to look at the results and make sense of them?
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Yes. At physician owned facilities you normally get a price that includes the read. For facilities that contract you normally have two bills, one for professional services (read) and one for technical (the study itself.) Expect to pay around $200 for an MRI read if the results are not already included in the price of the study.
 
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