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Comment by nradov | Hacker News Reader

Yep. Wealthy Canadians often come to the USA as medical tourists and pay cash to skip the queue at home for elective procedures like MRIs or joint replacements.

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You can pay for MRIs in Canada. My friend needed one and he had it within the week for $800.

I think private MRIs have been around, at least in my province anyways, for close to 30 years.

Hmm, that's good information to have, I had no idea. I just had an MRI appointment that I had completely forgotten about or what it was for I was waiting so long (and obviously not having the issue for anymore). I'll know this for next time and consider it.

$800!!

Jesus... I can get a chest-abdomen-pelvis MRI on US insurance for less than half of that, and the lead time is measured in weeks at most.

I'm happy to confess I don't understand US medical care but OP was saying that $800 was the price they paid but you're saying that if one had "US insurance" it would be "less than half of that" ?

I mean if you have insurance I don't know why it's costing you anything but regardless it's hardly surprising that you're cost is less than the person paying cash ?

Most people with insurance in the US have something called a “copay” although not all. And yes I’m surprised that it’s quicker or cheaper here than Canada.

That’s about 2X as expensive as the cash pay MRIs near me in the United States, which is interesting. You don’t have to wait a week here, but that’s to be expected with how many MRI machines are all over the place. For specialty imaging like contrast or doing time resolved MRI you do have to wait a little longer to get someone qualified to do it properly. Some of those take a little more expertise that the cash walk-in places aren’t good for.

$800 CAD is around $600 USD

Yes, I know. Cash pay MRIs in the US go for $300 plus or minus depending on the city.

Yeah is it legal to finance MRI machines as a business then and sell fast imaging? If it’s that bad near a big city could have a batch running constantly. Of course until the government healthcare system finds a bunch of money in a suitcase somewhere and decides to finally buy more machines, which would kill this business.

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