Don’t let illness or disease catch you off guard. Instead, prioritise your health by investing in a comprehensive full-body MOT — a highly effective way to safeguard both your present and future well-being.
As the old saying goes, you can’t put a price on your health. But, in the midst of a cost-of-living crisis, many people are now being a lot more frugal with their spending, researching any big outlays before giving them the go-ahead.
With this in mind, you might be wondering whether full-body MOTs are really worth the investment, questioning factors like their overall importance and what they actually offer.
In this article, we will provide answers to all of these questions and more, offering you all the information you need to make an informed decision on your health.
What is a full-body MOT?
First things first, let’s take a look at what a full-body MOT is and what it involves.
In simple terms, a full-body MOT is a comprehensive health check-up that assesses your entire body using a series of Measurements, Observations and Tests – or MOTs for short.
Here at Echelon Health, our health assessments involve examining your brain, heart, lungs, liver and kidney health as well as other organs, while also recording certain health markers such as your levels of cholesterol, protein, muscle mass, iron levels and hormone levels.
Available for both men and women, full-body MOTs are designed to use ongoing improvements in healthcare technology to not only provide an overview of your overall state of health but also detect certain health conditions much earlier on.
In a similar way to how you’d regularly get your car serviced, full-body MOTs help identify any potential issues before they manifest into bigger problems.
The importance of a full-body MOT
Being healthy is so much more than simply eating healthily, exercising regularly and getting enough sleep.
While these are all incredibly important pieces of healthy living advice, daily stresses and environmental factors can all increase the risk of developing severe health conditions like heart disease and cancer.
That’s why getting a full-body MOT performed on a regular basis can be so important — the earlier potential problems can be identified, the sooner they can be dealt with.
The benefits of a full-body MOT
Whether you are looking to have one once or twice a year, or every few years, full-body MOTs can offer a number of benefits to your overall health. These include:
- Early disease detection – full body MOTs identify potential health concerns before they manifest into problematic symptoms, significantly improving your likelihood of a successful outcome in the future.
- Tailored health insights – making personalised insights into your overall health and well-being allows tailored recommendations to be made on any relevant lifestyle changes you can make to optimise your health.
- Comprehensive assessment – due to the wide range of tests used, full-body MOTs provide a highly detailed overview of your health and can assess your susceptibility to developing various conditions long before you show any symptoms.
- Added reassurance – full-body MOTs allow you to not only take control of your health more easily but also make more informed decisions on your lifestyle with greater peace of mind.
- Long-term investment – being able to manage health risks allows you to make a long-term investment in yourself, helping catch potentially serious health complications earlier on and improving your overall quality of life.
To put things in context, our Platinum Health Assessment is able to detect 92% of the diseases that lead to premature death in men, and 95% in women.
Rather than using statistical models to predict your risk factors, our full-body MOT packages provide an in-depth analysis of your individual health, taking into account factors like your family history and lifestyle to identify any potential risks.
Using this information, we can then provide you with tailored advice and recommendations on how to improve your health.
Things to consider when getting a full-body MOT
Before deciding to go ahead with a full-body MOT, there are a few questions and things you will need to consider in advance to ensure you are getting value for money.
What is included?
Health check-ups can vary from clinic to clinic, so it’s important to know as much as possible going in, especially in terms of what’s included during your assessment. That way, you can feel rest assured that your health is in the best hands and that you are being assessed by a clinic you can trust, using a range of tests that are relevant to you.
Our full-body health checks, for example, include detailed assessments of each part of the body to give us the best overall picture of your health. To do this, we use a variety of tests — from MRI and CT scans, to ultrasounds and digital mammograms and use the right modality to scan for the relevant disease.
How much does it cost?
Due to their ability to identify potential health risks, full-body MOTs are considered excellent value for money. However, prices can vary according to what is included in the specific package.
At Echelon Health, we have smaller packages such as the Healthy Heart focusing on your heart health. But, depending on the type of measurements, tests and observations you would like, we have the bespoke option, which allows you to add other scans and tests on top to personalise your full physical examination to your specific requirements.
To find out more about what is included in each health screening package, take a look at our dedicated health assessments page.
How regularly should I get one?
Another key factor to consider when thinking about the cost is how regularly you would like to have a full-body MOT.
The answer to this varies from person to person but, generally speaking, if you take good care of your health and maintain a healthy lifestyle, attending a regular health check every five years from the age of 40 is the NHS’s recommendation. At Echelon Health, we recommend to have a health assessment every three years.
However, if you have a family history of certain diseases or have recently developed some symptoms you’re concerned about, a health check can be performed at any time, regardless of your age. The key thing is to listen to your body and act accordingly when you need to.
How do I choose the right clinic?
When searching for the best private health clinic, it’s crucial to choose one that respects and recognises its patients. Therefore, make sure to do your research in advance.
When conducting your full-body MOT, for example, your clinic should be using the most recent imaging technology. So don’t be afraid to enquire about the types of tests and scanners they offer to see if they’re right for you.
Similarly, your clinic should employ top medical professionals who are trusted by other patients. So, to check this for yourself, take some time to research their online profile by reading reviews on both their website and Google. Quality health care is not just about the doctors that will talk to you during your consultations, it is also about having experienced radiologists who will report on your scans so that the doctors are able to provide you with the best advice.
Take control of your health with Echelon Health
Back in 2020, the Marmot Report reported that the average life expectancy in England had stalled for the first time in a century.
While there are many nuanced reasons behind this, lifestyle choices are one of — if not the — key contributing factors towards some of the nation’s biggest killers, such as cancer, heart disease, stroke and lung disease. That’s why it’s imperative to take control of your health and prioritise your wellbeing in the right way.
By exercising regularly, getting between six and nine hours of sleep a night, sticking to a healthy diet and keeping stress levels to a minimum, you can help look after your health on a day-to-day basis and keep yourself in the best possible condition.
However, few things are better than a thorough health assessment which can identify the areas which you need to work on, in order to start improving your health. Our Platinum Assessment looks at your whole body, head to toe and leaves no stone unturned. The following tests and scans are all part of the Platinum Assessment:
- Medical Questionnaire & Pre-Assessment
- Blood Tests
- ECG
- CT Aorta
- CT Heart
- CT Coronary Angiogram
- CT Chest
- CT Pelvis
- CT Virtual Colonoscopy
- CT Bone Density
- EOS
- CT Upright Skeleton
- MRI Brain
- MRI Cerebral Artery Angiogram
- MRI Carotid Artery Angiogram
- MRI Prostate
- Ultrasound Thyroid
- Ultrasound Testes/ Ovaries
- Digital Mammogram
- Full Body Mole Screen
- Final Consultation
Full-body MOTs can then help safeguard your health over the long term, providing you with peace of mind that you’ll be protected should you start developing any symptoms or an underlying health condition.
To find out more about our full-body health assessments here at Echelon Health, simply get in touch with our team or download our dedicated brochure.
Sources:
https://www.nhs.uk/live-well/sleep-and-tiredness/how-to-get-to-sleep/
https://www.cancerresearchuk.org/health-professional/cancer-statistics/survival
https://cks.nice.org.uk/topics/stroke-tia/background-information/prognosis/
