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Sports Physicals
DOT Physicals
Well Woman Exams
General Physicals
Immigration Physicals
Applicants for adjustment of status must
have the forms I-693 and its supplemental filled out by a civil
surgeon. We make every attempt to fill your forms out right so
your immigration process goes smoothly. Our track record is very
good, and many immigration attorneys refer their clients to us
for the immigration physicals.
Here
is what will happen when you come in for immigration physical:
First you will fill out some brief forms.
Then we will invite you into an exam room, where we will ask
you some questions about your health and immunization status and
do a physical exam.
Based on the results of the exam and your health history we will
suggest certain procedures, including blood and urine tests, skin
test, chest X-ray and immunizations.
Read the following to be able to better understand the process
and possibly save money and aggravation.
Most health plans do not cover these services. You need to pay
us directly and we can provide you with the formal insurance forms
so you can bill them yourself. Some of our clients do get reimbursed,
but we can't guarantee it.
If you have insurance and it may pay for some of the tests and
immunizations you need, you can have them done at your primary
care clinic. Then you can ask your doctor to give you copies of
your records pertaining to these procedures and we will use them
to prepare your immigration form.
Immunizations
You are required to be immunized completely according to the
standard schedule. If you have any immunization records, whether
American or from your home country, please bring them in. It is
best to have them translated, but we can usually figure out even
the foreign records and apply all your immunizations towards your
INS requirements. Once we know which extra immunizations you need
we can give them to you or you can have them done at your primary
care doctor’s office.
Children under the age of 19 need the most shots, so please make
sure you get all the available records. We don’t want to
give them more shots than they really need.
If you would like to limit the number of immunizations you get,
we can do a blood test to test your immunity to certain childhood
illnesses (so called titer). If you test positive for the disease
in question, you do not need a shot. The titers for most diseases
are more expensive than the shots, so most people chose to just
do the shots.
Lab
tests
The main blood tests we do are those for HIV and syphilis. This
is required for all applicants age 15 and over. If you choose
to do titers for childhood illnesses, they are added to the same
test and you don’t need an extra needle stick. Sometimes
we need to add other tests (blood or urine) based on the exam
findings.
Skin test for Tuberculosis (PPD or Mantoux). This is required
for everybody age 2 and up
If you have ever had a positive skin test, please let us know.
It is not bad and will not affect your immigration process. If
you have ever had a positive test, we should not repeat it, because
it will be positive again and we will not gain any useful information.
A positive test means you have had some exposure to TB, either
actual disease or a vaccine. Most people have had a vaccination
for TB (BCG) in their early childhood, and it often renders them
somewhat positive for the rest of their life.
A positive test means that the area on your forearm that was
injected with the “antigen” swells up a bit. Then
the doctor would tell you the test is positive and send you for
a chest X-ray. So, if you’ve ever had a skin test which
was followed by a chest X-ray, the test was probably positive.
It would be helpful for us to see the record of the test and the
X-ray your doctor did.
In cases when the test was definitely positive in the past we
go straight to chest X-ray, so you avoid an unnecessary needle
stick with the following discomfort from the swelling on your
forearm.
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