Education on Xrays

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So I've been waiting for Dr. West to send me some information which would lead me to take another set of xrays. (In the meantime, I received an invoice from my insurance company. They will pay half of the bill for the 1st set of xrays from Dr. East's office. I will have to pay over $300 out of pocket! That means the visit and first meeting at Dr. East was about $700!) I would probably not mind this so much if Dr. East were to give me the proper files I could send to Dr. West. But he has refused stating he can't provide what I need.

This is against the law by the way. A patient, by law, has the rights to their records. You may have to fill out a request form, pay a small handling fee, but they are yours by law. Dr. East has basically given me my xrays but in a format no other doctor can use to measure to make diagnoses, etc.

My research taught me about the files being needed in a specific format. (After all I've been through I am very disappointed with Dr. West and his assistant, that through several emails of stating my difficulties, not once did they give me the proper format name for the files they needed. I had to research and learn myself.)

Fortunately, (I think ;-) I just had a mammogram and decided I would ask for copies of my xrays to see what they would provide. (A sort of test to see how hard this would be.) I had to fill out a request form. On it they asked what they would be used for. I wrote that I wanted to be able to take them to any other physician as well as for my own records. I waited about a week and a half, but they did provide a CD.

© DNC -
www.brachymetatarsia.blogspot.com

The files are in the format that my research indicated they should be. Something having to do with DICOM. (I'm on a Mac. DICOM is mostly used on PCs. I will test the CD tomorrow on a PC and let you know how it turns out.)

Anyway, as fate would have it, I have to make a short unrelated, impromptu trip out West! So of course I called Dr. West and set up an appointment to have him take another set of xrays. Terrible that I have to pay another bill on this. I'm inclined to try and contact Dr. East one more time and mentioning the actual format names I've learned and maybe say that I've spoken legally to some organization to see if he would then release the xrays in the format any other Doctor can use?

I feel if I do, he would claim he never got the email, or make me wait a terribly long time for them. But I'll stay positive and be thankful that in two week I'll be face to face with Dr. West and hopefully make up for lost time with Dr. East.

Oh and remember, this all hinges on my job. Being granted the many weeks to work off-site.... across the country? My company is going through some changes and I really don't want to be out of sight. But if all works well outside of that, I think I'll take the risk of being out of eye site. I work a bit from home already anyway for their pilot testing.

To say the least, I'm very excited. ;-)

NOTE: Aiming to provide all the details of the process may put out a gray tone, but please don't think that. (Giving all the detail I can will allow you to anticipate some possible things and hopefully avoid them if you can in your own corrective journey.) Anything worth doing will come with red-tape and with things that don't go your way. ;-)

But I'm happy about this as a whole!