Medical Tourist - The Results

I woke up Wednesday morning feeling a little anxious about the day’s activities.  Somewhere in my mind, I just knew they were going to find some rare and unpronounceable disease with a great deal of consonants in the spelling and a support group based out of Darfur.  I reluctantly got dressed and headed out for the news.

We had to go to the clinic to get the results rather than the hospital, since apparently, this is where my new doctor is based.  I arrived 15 minutes early and sat in the waiting room awaiting my, now familiar, medical consiglieri, Jian. The clinic was actually pretty nice with a small pharmacy and food kiosk (called Whole Foods) and some comfortable chairs in the middle.  An attendant approach me (apparently, I did not blend) and when he discovered I was part of the "platinum" package was very apologetic for having me wait with the "normal" people.  I was registered and rushed to the special VIP waiting room upstairs.  

This room was much nicer. It had a TV, a large soothing fish tank and a buffet.  It reminded me of a first class airport lounge in a small, developing country.  There were a few other gentlemen in the room and one by one they left and came back on the familiar blue hospital scrubs of the prior week.  I assume they were partaking in one of the less intrusive health packages. Smart guys.

Anyway, Jain arrived and we were escorted to the Doctor's office for the final results.  The Doctor was a pleasant Indian gentleman who tried hard to get my jokes and make the delivery of the news less boring and more relatable.  I appreciated this.  He began with the general tests which were surprisingly good and worked his way through the MRI, ultra-sound (still not pregnant), and ended up with the Angiogram.  Good, good, and good!  Lastly, he reviewed my Lipid Panel which is the measure of all things relating to cholesterol.  Apparently my bad cholesterol was OK, but my good cholesterol was in the red zone, but he felt this was weight related.  

So in summary, I paid $1500, was poked and prodded for two days and suffered a melt down while being stuffed into a torpedo tube all to be told I am fat.   Shit, my wife tells me that every day for free!  In the end, at least I now know I am not dying of some freak disease and, as a bonus, I got a handy parting gift of all the film and DVDs from all the tests to keep with me in case they ever do find something.  Who among you can say you carry around your MRI and angiogram recordings? 

I guess that alone was worth the price of admission!