Get an MRI and Go Shopping

Dr. Hadeer Shaikhly, formerly the chief of radiology at Windham Hospital in Connecticut, who recently opened an outpatient center for CT scans and MRIs in a local mall, encourages patients to drop in for an MRI or CT while they shop.
Shaikhly’s center provides night and weekend appointments and immediate review of the results. Plus, second reads by a certified outsourced service are free of charge.
“Pain and disease don’t wait, so why would you want to wait?” Shaikhly said about his radiology business. “We give them a little beeper. Just like the restaurants,” Shaikhly said.
Because scheduling non-emergency cases often entails a long wait at hospitals, Shaikhly offers a faster and what he considers a more convenient alternative. The center provides comfortable seating, entrances from both the mall and the parking lot and a plasma screen TV. Or for those who would rather shop, the center gives them a pager.
Shaikhly notes that with the onset of shrinking reimbursements and income from as a result of the DRA, physicians are branching off economically. While some physicians may be concerned that quick turn around times on CT and MRI scans may come at the cost of quality care, other clinicians may write it off as just another way that healthcare is changing with the times.