Asklemmy

43945 readers

641 users here now

A loosely moderated place to ask open-ended questions

Search asklemmy 🔍

If your post meets the following criteria, it's welcome here!

Open-ended question
Not offensive: at this point, we do not have the bandwidth to moderate overtly political discussions. Assume best intent and be excellent to each other.
Not regarding using or support for Lemmy: context, see the list of support communities and tools for finding communities below
Not ad nauseam inducing: please make sure it is a question that would be new to most members
An actual topic of discussion

Looking for support?

Looking for a community?

Lemmyverse: community search
sub.rehab: maps old subreddits to fediverse options, marks official as such
[email protected]: a community for finding communities

~Icon~ ~by~ ~@Double_[email protected]~

founded 5 years ago

MODERATORS

[email protected]

472

For the first time in my life, I have hit my deductible AND reached my out-of-pocket maximum. I now have three months of actual free healthcare, which is unheard of in the US. What should I get done? (sh.itjust.works)

submitted 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

176 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Biologically male procedures only. EDIT: If the two people who downvoted this question could explain their reasoning, I would be super interested. No judgements. This is a safe space!

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[–] [email protected] 17 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (1 children)

Talk to your primary doctor if they can get you a referral for an MRI. Insurance loves to try and deny MRIs, so I think a referral is probably required due to how expensive they are. IMO, they should be included in annual physicals since it's one of the only (if not the only) ways to detect brain tumors early, which is critical given how difficult it is to treat brain tumors and the earlier the better.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Medical authorities usually don't advocate for getting imagery like that as a screening tool without any relevant risk factors or symptoms. Everyone has stuff that is unique and weird about their bodies but completely benign, and chances are, it turns up in an MRI or CT. This can end up leading to unnecessary invasive procedures to remove or biopsy something. The odds (in the literal sense) are that not-called for screening leads to either worse outcomes or the same outcomes as people who didn't get the screenings.

I didn't look up a source for MRI specifically, cause that's pretty broad, but here's a report that does a good job explaining it for prostate cancer screenings. The logic is the same.

https://www.uspreventiveservicestaskforce.org/uspstf/document/RecommendationStatementFinal/prostate-cancer-screening

[–] [email protected] -1 points 2 months ago

I mean, sure, but if it detects something and there's no reason to suspect it's necessarily cancerous, then I'd hope doctors would recommend just keeping an eye on it and possibly scheduling periodic checkups to ensure it doesn't continue growing. No competent doctor is going to recommend invasive surgery right off the bat.