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Comment by the_only_law | Hacker News Reader

At what point can I just purchase old medical machinery on eBay and run my own blood tests and stuff.

The cost and bureaucracy required to get one working will probably kill this idea. Those machines require consumables to run the tests, as well as for calibration and QA. The vendor might be willing to sell you the supplies and send a technician to get the machine set up to run a valid test, but it won’t be cheap, and they might be unwilling if it’s some guy trying to run the machine in his garage rather than a medical facility. Beyond that, there is a reason that the machine is on eBay and not being sold or donated. It could be obsolete and the supplies unobtainable, or simply beyond economic repair.

From my experience, in most states you can order whatever tests you want from Private MD Labs and just walk into any LabCorp location and get your blood taken and a PDF of your results emailed to you within 24 hours.

No need to buy the machinery, unless you really want to.

You can order your own tests right now from LabCorp and Quest, through sites like requestatest.

LabCorp and Quest both have their own products for this, too:

https://www.ondemand.labcorp.com/ https://questdirect.questdiagnostics.com/

Which are just a wrapper for asking one of their in-house doctors to prescribe you the test you requested, without a real review of your need or the actual potential benefit for you in doing so. So it technically meets the letter of the government requirements for medical tests, but not necessarily the intention behind restrictions around tests.

Does anyone know of EU based alternatives to the above?

Yes, social democracy and the welfare state.

This isn't a helpful answer.

What do you mean? There are always private places where to get tests done. Synlab is one of the biggest in Europe. Or you mean to take them at home?

Labcorp is fantastic. I do my own yearly checkups through them. You can pay 100-200$ and get a comprehensive panel done on you even checking your testosterone or estrogen levels. You can pay a few bucks and have a doc review your results too or you can give them to a teledoc to review that most insurance providers have.

I hate going to the doctor's office to have them order a panel so that I can go to a labcorp and have the doc call me and say everything is good. It's all free but my time isn't.

Going directly to labcorp bypasses everything and they give me the results to review myself.

I hear you can get a good deal on "Edison" branded blood test machines. Questionable reliability though.

Yes but I heard they were invented by a genius so that's something!

The gatekeeping these incompetent doctors do is infuriating. If I want a random blood test, why do I need to pay a doctor for to order the test from the third party lab. They add nothing to the process except frustration and expense.

I hate to be so negative, but it's likely that by the time you have significant medical conditions to worry about, you will no longer have the time/spirit to engage in such productive playing.

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