More and more people are trying to safeguard their health by undergoing extensive tests. But is such costly action necessary and are the results worth it? Susan Calnan reports
In an increasingly health conscious society where statisticians warn us about growing rates of heart disease and cancer or about the threat of an obesity epidemic, more and more Irish people are starting to take a pro-active approach to their health.
Despite shortcomings in our health service, the private medical sector has raised the bar somewhat with the growing trend in private health screening clinics - a one-stop-shop for people who want to access the most up-to-date health facilities and who are interested in putting their health first.
Celebrating its 20th anniversary this year, Irish Health Care at the Blackrock Clinic is one of the longest running health screening clinics in Dublin and, according to staff, it is inundated with requests from people who want to book private medical screenings.
The centre also has plans to open another branch later this summer at a new private clinic, which is currently underway in Galway. Irish Health Care provides a comprehensive screening programme, tailored according to the age and sex of the client, which covers everything from respiratory function testing, blood screening, liver and kidney function testing to cardiac screening and bone density analysis. It also caters for a number of additional screening options on top of its standard programme, including stress ECGs, mammogram and smear tests and vascular ultrasounds.
"When we first opened, the majority of our clients came from the corporate sector," says Anne Leonard, manager of Irish Health Care.
"But in the last five years, in particular, people from every walk of life are visiting our clinic. The beauty of health screening is that everything is done under the one roof, in a few hours and in the same day," she says.
"Most people just want an overall check-up, and health screening gives people great peace of mind, particularly as they get older and start to worry about their health more."
A relative newcomer to the health screening market, The Well at the Beacon Clinic in Sandyford has also reported a successful take-up of its service, and has already carried out more than 700 executive health screenings since it first opened for business in April of last year.
The centre sees itself as taking a more holistic approach to the health screening concept and as well as employing a number of doctors in its new state-of-the-art centre in Sandyford, it also employs a range of other specialists including a lifestyle consultant, psychoanalyst, acupuncturist and occupational health specialist. To date, more than 60 per cent of its clients have come from the corporate sector and the remainder from individuals who book independently.
"So far our service has been very well received and we are getting a lot of referrals through word-of-mouth from people who recommend the centre to family, friends or work colleagues," says Anne-Lise Mion, business development manager of The Well.
"I think people are beginning to realise the long-term benefits that can be obtained from taking a pro-active approach to their health. If people assess their health and lifestyle earlier on in life and make positive changes where necessary, then it will help to prolong their life and hopefully reduce the amount of money they need to spend on healthcare later on in life," she says.
According to its latest figures, the average age of clients visiting The Well is in the early 40s and since it first opened,Mion says, they have had more male clients than female clients.
"We have found that there are an increasing number of men, in particular, who don't have their own GP or who haven't visited the doctor in a very long time and, as a result, are falling through the net in terms of proper health monitoring," says Mion.
"Sometimes it's not until a friend or a work colleague of the same age in their late 40s or 50s gets sick that men start to worry about their own health; many men are now opting for health screening to check that everything is okay and that they are not at risk of any diseases," Mion adds.
Although more Irish people are now opting for comprehensive health screening in clinics such as The Well and Irish Health Care, the chairman of communications with the Irish College of General Practitioners (ICGP), Dr Niall Ó Cléirigh, questions the long-term cost-effectiveness of such clinics.
"These centres are providing a service and obviously there's a need out there for this type of service, but I feel if one was to analyse them using strict methods of evidence-based, cost-effective medicine, they wouldn't necessary stand up to that kind of scrutiny," says Ó Cléirigh.
"For example, there's no evidence-based research to show that screening people, say in their 30s, for cardiovascular disease is cost-effective in the long term," he says.
"I would also question the validity of sending people in their 20s or 30s to health screening clinics such as these. While it is probably more justified for people in their 50s to opt for these type of screenings, I don't see why people can't consult their own GPs instead and go through things such as family medical history to pick out any potential risk areas and to identify changes they need to make to avoid illness," Ó Cléirigh adds.
Dr David Kilcoyne, medical director of MediCheck, one of Ireland's longest running private health screening centres at the Charlemont Clinic in Dublin, argues, however, that private health screening clinics are cost-effective.
"If you think in round figures of say €400 for a full health screening every two to three years, it's not that expensive, particularly if you pick up a patient who is in the early stages of something like diabetes or heart disease or prostate cancer. You cannot discredit the enormous benefit it will have to that person in the long term, if you detect an illness in the early stages and help them to make the necessary changes before it progresses," says Kilcoyne.
He also stresses that the clinic doesn't generally encourage people in their 20s to go for health screening, unless they have a family history of a particular illness that may be of concern to them. Their core market is, he says, the 30 to 65 years age group and the average age of clients to date has been in the mid-to-late 40s age bracket. Once patients have been screened, the clinic always encourages the client to show their results to their own GP or to consult their GP if they find a problem that needs regular monitoring.
Although Kilcoyne does admit that many family doctors were sceptical in the past about private health screening clinics such as their own, he feels that more and more doctors are coming around to the idea of such clinics.
"It's very hard for a GP in a busy practice to sit down and give an hour of their time to a patient who has no symptoms but who wants to have a detailed screening, when they have a room full of patients outside waiting to be treated," says Kilcoyne.
"I think over time there will be a more co-operative relationship between family doctors and these clinics and that doctors will start to refer more of their patients for screening in these centres," he says.
"To use an analogy, we see ourselves as the external auditors of a business while GPs are, if you like, the in-house financial controllers of an organisation. As auditors we take a snapshot of the balance sheet of life, to assess whether a person is trading well, or if they need to make provisions for a bad debt down the road.
"Once we make our assessment, we then hand the person back to the in-house financial controller of the business, that is the GP, who is responsible for the day-to-day running of the business and who will monitor how well it is doing over time," he adds.
Further information on health screening is available from Medicheck at the Charlemont Clinic, 01-418 8444; The Well at Beacon Clinic, 01-294 5444; or Irish Health Care at Blackrock Clinic 01-2880111.