Posted on 01/22/2005 4:16:37 PM PST by neverdem
Edited on 10/21/2005 4:59:15 PM PDT by Admin Moderator. [history]
For a brief moment, Dr. Thomas Giannulli, a Seattle internist, thought he was getting in at the start of an exciting new area of medicine. He was opening a company to offer CT scans to the public - no doctor's referral necessary. The scans, he said, could find diseases like cancer or heart disease early, long before there were symptoms. And, for the scan centers, there was money to be made.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
I wonder how many radio hosts got free scans for hocking these places on their programs!
There is a remarkable lesson to be learned from these few words---take gubmint money out of medical care and prices will tumble. Basic supply/demand and all that...
My thoughts exactly.
BodyScan shill Melanie Morgan of KSFO is deeply saddened.
"The goal in life seems to be to try to figure out some way where you don't have to go to the hospital, where you don't have to take calls," Dr. Rosenkrantz said. "Radiologists saw this as a cash business and a way out."
Doesn't anybody want to work anymore?
My brother thought that things like this should be mandatory for all. He's a regular little Hillary in his health care views. Guess it just didn't work out.
Unfortunately, the medical payments system is using required invasive hospital procedures to depreciate the cost of fixed capital and to help carry the cost of treating illegal aliens in emergency rooms. I seriously doubt that a fair economic cost/benefit analysis is possible, especially considering the array of vested interests involved.
This needs to be repeated over and over and over and over again.
INSURERS WERE OUT OF THE PICTURE AND THE PRICE PLUMMETED.
This is the lamest defense yet; and perhaps betrays the more common reason for this industry's demise. I mean. . .how many people have had a test based on a 'suspicion'. . .that turned out to be something innocuous.
Good grief. . .this is the traditional route that many follow; having had an exam by their own Doctor. Of course, herein lies the bigger problem; someone ie . . .a physician; is getting cut out of the traditional routing/appointment path of patient. . .or so they imagine.
Think, in fact, this would have increased their patient load; as more people are willing to initiate medical exams at a less invasive starting point. . .
But whatever: the 'better safe than sorry' route, probably merits a huge amount of the 'testing business'. . .some of that sorry of course, being protection against the dreaded law suit.
Just this week heard three people say they were getting 'cat scans' for their sinuses. . .ok. . .not saying it is not warrented; but the sudden popularlity of scanned sinusis; for a sinus infection. . .makes me pause and wonder. . .
THAT said. . .I am sorry these places are closing. I think, at some point in time; they will be back; and be more acceptable; perhaps even the required 'first step' to medical evaluations.
But then. . .what do I know! ;^#
Within the past two months I got two letters from a woman doctor in my area inviting me to come in for a scan. I figured she must be desperate. I threw them in the garbage.
As usual the NYT's reporter is rather ignorant and uninformed and only reporting half of the story. It is t rue that a "whole body" ct scan sham is not good evidenced based medicine.
However, targeted focused ct scans have an important and growing role in disease detection screening. Namely, virtual colonoscopy (ct scan) is a quicker, cheaper, and a less time consuming surrogate than endoscopic colonoscopy (make sure it's performed on a state of the art 16 or 64 channel mutidetector ct with 3d workstation software).
In addition, a cardiac coronary artery calcium score is a good independent predictor of coronary artery disease. And can help stratify those patients who need statin therapy.
As with anything in medicine - get educated and ask around.
You caught that, did you?!!!! I guess it's still a dirty little secret though.....
Um, maybe that was part of the problem, Whoopie Goldberg -- a huge credibility gap.
Oh, and don't expect the NYTimes to put two and two together to come up with four on this little cat the let out of the bag!
FReepmail me if you want on or off my health and science ping list.
And Oprah...
bttt
Precisely what I was thinking. I just turned 50 and am due for a colonoscopy and have been seriously considering this alternative, especially because it can find polyps on surfaces of the colon of which optical equipment is incapable. Thanks for the specifications.
Bill
hamartoma A benign (noncancerous) tumor which is made up of tissues normally found in the area that it is in, but in an unusual mixture. This type of tumor results from a developmental anomaly of embryonic cells.
false-positive (false-pos·i·tive) (fawls¢pos¢[ibreve]-tiv) 1. denoting a test result that wrongly assigns an individual to a diagnostic or other category, e.g., one that labels a healthy person as diseased in screening for detection of that disease. 2. an individual so categorized. 3. an instance of a false-positive result.
I probably spent over an hour at PubMed trying to find the incidence and prevalence of hamartomas. Here's PubMed if you feel lucky. Click on related articles.
The issue is if you are asymptomatic and the next step in the workup is an invasive procedure to obtain a biopsy for a possibly benign lesion.
Well many of them are being out sourced.. aren't we told the answer to outsourcing is good old fashioned free enterprise ?
I would have paid for a body scan .. why not?
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