PSA: Mammograms & Covid

[chlobo]

Also, some places/doctors of course are all for additional imaging or procedures that increases their billing and ends up being unnecessary. A combo of "CYA" medicine and plus get some additional procedures to bill is very much alive and well in medicine in this country. (I work in a practice with multiple different doctors and they all have very different opinions on what is 'necessary' and when additional testing is warranted.)

What kind of additional imaging happens in this case? Do you mean imaging they might have to do because they detect something on the routine screen that is done close too Covid/vax that turns out to be the result of Covid/Vax? Or were you speaking in general?

[jgenie]

Also, some places/doctors of course are all for additional imaging or procedures that increases their billing and ends up being unnecessary. A combo of "CYA" medicine and plus get some additional procedures to bill is very much alive and well in medicine in this country. (I work in a practice with multiple different doctors and they all have very different opinions on what is 'necessary' and when additional testing is warranted.)

I had my second yearly appointment with a new doctor and I very much felt this. Last year she used the vaginal ultrasound to double check my ovaries. I thought she was just being thorough. This year she again used the vaginal ultrasound to double check my ovaries. My previous practice had never done an ultrasound except for my pregnancies. I left thinking perhaps she was padding the bill although not sure if the ultrasound is billed separately or part of the standard appointment. We’ll see what happens next year.

[AngB]

I had my second yearly appointment with a new doctor and I very much felt this. Last year she used the vaginal ultrasound to double check my ovaries. I thought she was just being thorough. This year she again used the vaginal ultrasound to double check my ovaries. My previous practice had never done an ultrasound except for my pregnancies. I left thinking perhaps she was padding the bill although not sure if the ultrasound is billed separately or part of the standard appointment. We’ll see what happens next year.

I am an ultrasound tech and I have never heard of this as an indication for an ultrasound, so yeah, unless she felt something abnormal or possibly if you have a family history of ovarian cancer, it is definitely not standard of care or indicated to check your ovaries especially two years in a row. Now, if she just did it herself, in office, it's possible she didn't bill for it. (At my ob after our pregnancy loss I was super paranoid and the nurse practitioner took pity on me and gave me an ultrasound every week for the first month or two...but didn't bill it because it was just with the standard pregnancy global billing and they didn't have a sonographer or anything do it, she just scanned me herself really quick on the machine.)

[AngB]

What kind of additional imaging happens in this case? Do you mean imaging they might have to do because they detect something on the routine screen that is done close too Covid/vax that turns out to be the result of Covid/Vax? Or were you speaking in general?

Both, general and specifically.

They know, that if you come too close to the vax/booster and they let you do your mamm, now they can tell you to have an ultrasound or follow up in 6 months. More billing.

Places that are crazy busy and don't have time for these games might make their patients wait the 6 weeks, some places might allow it but note enlarged lymph node- most likely due to vax- and follow up next year, etc. (I am pretty sure the rads where I work were just documenting but not recommending anything extra if there was a recent vax but that was a few months ago.) Places that value the $$ first and foremost of course are going to have people come in and get additional testing. (I'm not saying that's the motive for *all* of them but seems pretty sketchy to allow a mamm at a time when you know there's a likely abnormality due to the vaccines and then order extra testing when the expected "abnormality" happens to make sure it's vaccine related...)

I mostly work in ob/gyn these days but there's a huge variety in what is "necessary" depending on the doctor.