Full Medical Check Up
Full Medical Check Up

Everything You Want to Know About a Full Medical Check-up

A general examination of your body conducted by the GP or registered doctor is often termed as a full physical examination. The examination covers almost all the basic systems of your body, including the heart, lung, nerves and the guts. In addition to this, there can be additional elements included in the test, which depends on your medical condition.

A full medical exam along with your clinical history, are the two basic foundations of modern medicine. However, medical technology has improved a lot in the recent times. Thus, it is now possible to diagnose many diseases and conditions just by blood tests and X-ray plates.

A physical examination starts with the patient's consent. Usually, when a male doctor performs the diagnosis on female patients, a chaperone remains present. The examination requires exposing certain parts of the patient's body. The examination begins with measuring the blood pressure, heart rate, body temperature and the rate of respiration.

Any physical examination can be divided into 4 parts:

  • Inspection or tracing signs of abnormality.
  • Palpation or feeling for signs.
  • Percussion or tapping for signs while diagnosing the lung or performing the gut examination.
  • Auscultation or listening inside a patient's body using the stethoscope (in earlier times, stethoscope wasn't used and doctors listened directly using their ear).

The examinations may or may not occur in the sequence discussed above. This sequence varies widely from doctor to doctor and depends on the personal preference of a medical expert conducting the examination.

As already mentioned above, the examination demands, exposing the private parts of a patient's body and touching the tender spots. While conducting the examination, it is the GPs responsibility to keep the patient comfortable. Once the examination procedure is over, a patient is asked to dress up and then the doctor explains the clinical findings.

Physical examination involves no severe risks other than some discomfort for the patients. Full medical check-up through physical examination is still relevant today in certain cases. It is non-invasive, low cost and helpful in revealing a patient's state of health. The only cost included here is the fee of the doctor conducting the examination. Thus, it is widely used to diagnose diseases like breast cancer, prostate cancer and skin cancer.