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Comment by jtlienwis | Hacker News Reader

Ten years ago I got an MRI when they were searching for kidney stone. I think the hospital charge was over $3000. I had one last year and the charge was less than $500. You can point to MRI as one of the success stories for technology in health care.

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I paid $2000 for a wrist MRI scan in US and $200 for one in Nairobi.

Basically anything in US will be 10X expensive because we have wonderful and very efficient healthcare for doing even the most basic things like CT, XRay, MRI etc. /s

Hospitals around here charge ~$2000 for a CT scan. The price isn't coupled to the cost of the machine.

A computed tomography scan is not MRI. It involves ionizing radiation (xrays). Not that an xray scan should cost $2000.

Yes, I'm aware of the difference. Typically, CT is more available and cheaper, which is why I thought it was a relevant point of comparison.

Which country? Doesn’t sound like a US hospital.

You can get a world class MRI in the Bay Area for $550 from SimonMed Imaging.

Now we just need a good AI to read it.

This would be especially useful in the developing world.

Radiologists are cheap and plentiful in the developing world, compared to MRI machines.

Nope, that is incorrect.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_radiology

https://www.forbes.com/sites/techonomy/2014/11/08/philippine...

Fair rebuttal, but I don't know if medical cartels would allow AI to replace their limited supply of cardiologists so easily.

It is quite cheap here in India already (got an orbital MRI last week for $105.10, including radiologist's fees; it can go as low as $40) but having it cheaper and more easily available would help a lot more people.

You can also get a worse MRI on obsolete equipment at UCSF for $18k. Ask me how I know!

Is that cash price? Does that include the radiologist interpretation? And can you get one without a prescription?

Cash price. Based on how the thing was billed, I am 90% sure it included interpretation, but at this point I can't remember for sure. I don't know whether the prescription is mandatory, but I'm sure you can email/call them.

There's a ton of small clinics around the U.S. unaffiliated with hospitals that offer MRIs for far less. Just Google it. These places will usually even give you a price ahead of time, you'll never get that from a hospital.

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