Yes we accept Medicare. If you fill out the new patient form on our website, a member of our team will reach out to you and verify all of your insurance info before going any further. Thanks!
Hello from KS 🌻 My PTH is 263 but my calcium is normal. My Dr finally referred me to an endocrinologist. I wish I could just fly there & have surgery. It’s out of network for my health ins. I’ve filled out the calcium pro app. My score is on the high side of possible. My thyroid ultrasound and Nuc med study were normal. What questions should I ask at my endocrine consult?
I practice in the Pacific Northwest. I refer hyper parathyroid patients to your offed only. Given the distance I’m asking my patients to travel, I want to be certain I’ve got the right dx. So I try to get three sets of labs with Ca and PTH. Sometimes the Ca will go back under 10, and I’m not so sure it’s hyper parathyroidism. Because of our location, I put most of my patients on high doses of D - 5000-10000 with most pts achieving a D level of 70-100. If Ca levels are >10, with PTH in normal range, how should I interpret this to avoid patients having to travel such a great distance unnecessarily?
Yes, our surgeons typically like to have three sets of labs to make a proper diagnosis. Vitamin D does play a role in our diagnosis as over supplementation can raise the blood Calcium levels a few points. We would take that into account when analyzing the patient’s labs. For your peace of mind, we do not put patients through our intake process without screening the labs you submit. We first qualify the labs and may ask for labs to be redrawn if we feel supplements (Calcium or Vit D) are playing a role in the patient’s results. We base our diagnosis on age related Calcium and PTH levels and we do not use additional diagnosis testing. We know “normal” lab values are often missed in a positive diagnosis. In these cases, we would use additional factors like a positive Dexa scan, kidney stones and symptoms related to hyperparathyroidism. We do ask a patient to travel here from that great distance unless we have made a proper positive diagnosis so please feel comfortable in referring patients to our website to complete our new patient form.
