Radiology and Scans with Sanitas

You cannot book a scan. Somebody has to send you for one, and that is the difference between this specialty and every other in the directory.

You cannot book a scan yourself

This is the difference between radiology and almost everything else in the directory. With a cardiologist or a dermatologist you ring and book. With a scan, a doctor has to request it.

That is not an insurance rule so much as a medical one. A scan answers a specific question, and the doctor asking the question decides which scan answers it. So the route is: see the specialist, they write the request, you take the request to a radiology centre and book.

It also means the specialist you see first matters. A good one requests the right scan the first time.

The waiting periods on scans

Ordinary imaging has no waiting period. X-rays, standard ultrasound, basic tests. Covered from the start of your policy.

Complex diagnostic tests carry a 6-month wait. That is where MRI and CT scans sit. If your policy is four months old and you need an MRI, it is not covered unless it is an emergency.

Emergencies override the wait entirely. A scan needed urgently after an accident is covered from day one.

What the different scans are for

• X-ray – bones, chest. Fast, cheap, everywhere.
• Ultrasound – soft tissue, pregnancy, abdomen. No radiation.
• CT scan – detailed cross-sections, good for internal injury and chest problems. Quick, uses X-rays.
• MRI – the most detailed for joints, spine and brain.
• Mammogram – breast screening.
• Bone density – osteoporosis.

MRI is the one people have most questions about, and it has a guide of its own: MRI scans in Spain covers how it differs from a CT scan, what the appointment is like, contrast dye and safety.

How fast you get one privately

You do not have to use the nearest centre. If the one down the road is booked and one an hour away is free tomorrow, you can go there – and for a scan, where you have it makes no difference to the result.

Where the radiology centres are

800 clinics across 50 provinces, with 1,750 named specialists between them – and a doctor has to request the scan, so you reach these through whichever specialist you saw first.

• Barcelona – 122 centres, 301 radiologists
• Madrid – 115 centres, 523 radiologists
• Malaga – 41 centres, 81 radiologists
• Valencia – 34 centres, 112 radiologists
• Murcia – 31 centres, 39 radiologists
• Seville – 30 centres, 46 radiologists
• Cadiz – 30 centres, 40 radiologists

Guadalajara and Melilla have only one or two radiology centres each, so if you are somewhere very rural, check before you assume.

Language

Less of an issue here than elsewhere. You are lying still while a machine does the work, and the conversation is brief. The report, though, is written in Spanish and goes back to the doctor who requested it. If you want to understand it yourself, ask them to talk you through it.

What you pay

Nothing at the centre on a no-co-payment plan. On a co-payment plan there is a fixed amount per test, usually higher for an MRI or CT than for an X-ray, and still a fraction of the several hundred euros a private MRI costs without cover.

See every Sanitas waiting period in one place, including how switching from another insurer waives nearly all of them.

Find a radiology centre near you

Browse radiology in the Sanitas directory – by province, with addresses, phone numbers and a map.