Physical Exam vs. Check Up

A physical exam is definitely more detailed and invasive than a check-up. My annual physicals always included height & weight, blood work, urinalysis, blood pressure, EKG, chest x-ray (occasionally) and a full head to toe exam, including the DRE for prostate. On occasion, I would go back for a check-up which was limited seeing if to a previous issue was been resolved, or where I needed to submit a health form.

It seems like every time I go to the doctor for sinus infection etc I always get checked out pretty throughly. My physicals personal and work are through too

What's the difference between a Yearly Wellness Exam and an Annual Physical Exam ?

What's the difference between a Yearly Wellness Exam and an Annual Physical Exam ?

Insurance nomenclature.

What's the difference between a Yearly Wellness Exam and an Annual Physical Exam ?

I would have said semantic, but I guess insurance companies are masters at manipulating and squeezing the last ounce of nuance and meaning out of words ...😃

A bit more seriously though, it sounds like a Wellness Exam is a term used to make you feel OK before even coming in for the exam, while the Annual Physical is a classic term and a bit more serious sounding.

I can't find a difference between 'physical exam' and 'check-up'. Why check-up could not be as thorough as physical exam? 😃

Since I am diabetic I get a check up every three months. Mostly this is to review the results of my blood work. There is the usual check of vital signs and a listen to my heart and lungs. Also I get a foot inspection. Nothing except shoes and docks come off. The doctor just pulls up my shirt. Now once a year I get a physical which is thorough and for that everything comes off. I am examined head to toe and have genital and rectal exams including tests for blood in stool. So for me there is a difference.

The funny part is it's really hard to differentiate whether your doctor is going to ive you a physical exam or a checkup when you schedule your appointment!

And how do you classify the term "once over"?

In my opignon this is also an insurance question!

Insurance companies and pension funds mostly require a full medical exam which includes also a "going through" from head to toe.

Privatly I ask my doc for a checkup once a year. (Testing my blood and listening to my hart incl. blood pressure.Then there is no need to risrobe completely! Shirt off is enough!

I see my PCC twice a year. One exam is a full head to toe physical, complete with hernia check, genital exam, and prostate exam. The other six months later is a simple check up. HEENT, heart, lungs, check my BP meds, and that's about it.

My doctor and his staff call it physical exam, check up, visit, it's all the same to them. Doctor always asks "are you having any issues?" and proceeds with Q&A. last visit he had me remove my shirt & undershirt. He asked me to just lower my pants and underwear for quick genital exam, my half hour was over before I knew it !

I am 29 and had a physical today. First one since maybe high school.

The doctor did not do a genital exam or prostate check. I was kind of surprised.

Hey Flettch, when your Dr. visit was scheduled, was it referred to as a "physical" or a "check up?" Also, love to hear the details of your exam sometime, maybe in another forum. Too bad you were not offered a urogenital exam...next visit I recommend you ask for one if it's not offered. If you younger, it's always a great idea to have testicle exam...even if you're older, hell, any age. Was Dr. visit for pre-employment or other type? Thanks!

When making an appointment, physical and check up are not the same. The person making the appointment at the doc's office will block out more time for a physical. At the large group practice where we have the bulk of our appointments, a physical gets at least 30 minutes time slot, whereas a check up or follow up will get 10 or 15 minutes.

My doctor makes the distinction...physical exams are my annual more in-depth check-up...if he wants me to come back to check on something in three or six months, he'll refer to that as a check-up and it usually won't require any significant disrobing.

I believe this mostly depends on the individual doctor or practice. Until fairly recently I always thought of the phrases physical exam, check-up, annual or yearly, as meaning basically the same thing. My previous PCP, female family med doctor, put me on BP meds when I first started seeing her years ago for a back problem. She told me then that I needed to come in every year or so to make sure there were no problems. When my prescription would run out I would call the office and say I needed a check-up to refill my meds. When the assistant took me back to the exam room, she would always take my BP, temp, etc. and confirm why I was there. She always used the phrase, "You're here for a check-up?". When the doctor saw me we had at most a 5 minute conversation and she examined me for maybe 2 minutes. Looked briefly at my head (sometimes throat, sometimes ears, eyes, nose, it varied every visit) then would listen to my heart and lungs. Sometimes she would do a very brief abdominal exam or thump on my back a bit, sometimes she didn't. I never had to undress at all. Sometimes I had my labs done before the visit and we would go over that, sometimes it was done after and they would call with the results.

This continued for years. Finally as I got older, I started thinking that I wanted a bit more from my healthcare provider. When I called the office the next time, I used the phrase yearly check-up to schedule my next appointment. The assistant this time used the exact same phrase to confirm why I was there, "yearly check-up". I got the exact same exam from the doctor. The next time I called and used the phrase "my annual" to schedule. The assistant once again asked, "You're here for your annual?". I got the same exact exam from the doctor.

Finally, I called to schedule and used the words physical exam. In the exam room the assistant asked if I was there for a physical, and I confirmed that I was. I thought, finally I'm going to get some action! The assistant leaves the room and again I don't have to undress any. No big deal I thought, this can still go in any number of ways when the doctor comes in. Once she came in and sat down, she again confirmed that i am there for a physical. She then had a short conversation, more with herself than me I think, about how that may actually be cheaper and insurance and on and on. She then said with a physical the main difference is we need to make sure I'm doing testicular self exams at home, and that when I turn 50 we discuss prostate exams and if/ when I need to do that. She then conducted the same exact 2 minute exam I'd had for years. I was out the door 5 minutes after she came in. From a medical perspective, if she didn't see a need to examine anything else, then I'm fine with that. From a medfet perspective... what a let down!!!

Reply to BendOver, that's pretty much what I get, to the point now that I don't go in. Its a waste of my co-pay, waste of their time and I get nothing from it. I can check my own BP at the CVS next to my office, I can even see my heart monitor on my smart watch. The only reason they want me in the office is to justify a bill. I'm now 18 months to two years without a visit. If my Dr. decides to pull my BP meds, I wont be heart broken. But I am not wasting half a day waiting for a pointless exam which benefits nobody except the insurance company profits.

Reply to BendOver, that's pretty much what I get, to the point now that I don't go in. Its a waste of my co-pay, waste of their time and I get nothing from it...

It all depends on the doctor, it can be a night and day difference on what a physical exam can entail. Not long after the encounter I wrote about previously I switched to a male family med doctor. Huge improvement in care. On my first visit to him, he spent 45 minutes or so asking me questions and getting to know my history, concerns, and interests. Then he used that information to determine how to examine me physically. He ended up giving me the most thorough exam of my life, by far. He didn't just examine everything to check the boxes either. As he would move to the next item and begin examining that body part he would briefly explain to me why he was examining it and/ or what he was looking for.

My advice to anyone who's not getting what you expect from your doctor is to try a different doctor. Sometimes you have to kiss a lot of frogs before you find your prince.

I don't think the words make any difference but the type of doctor does. If you want a thorough physical exam, stop going to family docs or GPs. Those doctors are fine docs I'm sure. They are usually limited in time and not able to do full exams. Schedule with an internist and you will have more comprehensive care.

I don't think the words make any difference but the type of doctor does.

Probably this. I called to schedule one about 2 years ago and asked for a "check up," probably because it sounded less imposing, and the front desk corrected me with a matter of fact "oh, a physical."

Does seem that my doctor is a bit more thorough than some that get talked about on here. Nothing needless, but definitely thorough.

I'm a much more frequent visitor to the doctor now than I was before my mid-30s, but a couple times I did intend to go in for physicals but got "check ups" instead, so yeah I had that confusion too. I remember when I was like 32 or so I was expecting to dress down to my undies, and I didn't even take my shirt off. 😜

IMO there's no real difference. It's semantics.

In the U.S. insurance industry the key is if the exam is for preventative care or for a specific issue. The exams may end up being exactly the same except for the reimbursement. Preventive care is covered 100% without copay or deductible. Other exams are not.

Example: Mammography if done as an annual preventive check is paid in full. The same exam given as a follow up to a specific issue is subject to insurance copay and deductible.

At the doctors office I go to there’s a difference. So you get a physical it’s just a basic sports physical that you would receive at a drug store. But a check up is usually when they check your genitals.

In my experience it varies by doctor and by patient...

I have had “check ups” where nothing much came off and the most invasive part was just the blood draw.

All that said, when my wife went for a check up, he had her in a gown, which was lowered for stething her bare chest.

I have found the term “physical” relative to a doctor visit, to usually require total disrobing for a female, but not always for a male. In that regard, my pants are usually unzipped for lower abdomen stuff and down for the DRE.

Again, our current doctor has my wife totally undressed under a flimsy gown, which he uses to selectively expose her most intimate parts for his viewing and probing pleasure.

In summary, my experience is that male doctors find more reasons for the disrobing of females than they do males no matter if the visit is a check up or physical. But that’s cool, if I had gone to medical school, I would be doing that exact thing today under the guise of “plausible deniability” of wrong-doing as that sacred professional “the doctor.”

I have used the terms interchangeably. I do however think that they convey different meanings, especially as it comes to what takes place. For my girls, I will say that they have a check up if it's likely to be a minimal exam like maybe a sport's physical. School physicals to start the year off would not count as the doctor will require a complete going over and being fully disrobed! Similarly for my own exams, a check up may be just to sign off for work but my "annual" is going to be a physical and that means every inch is evaluated and probed!

Hope it clarifies how I regard these terms!

I think of a “check up” as what I used to receive from my primary care physician which was pretty much a 5 minute discussion about blood work results. A physical exam is what I currently receive from my internist - a complete, full-body exam.

I remember going to the doctor when I was 10 when I had the chickenpox. I was told by the nurse to take off my shirt. The checkup was reasonably thorough although I very much noticed that there was no genital exam. I even thought that maybe they wouldn't do that anymore. The following year when I was 11 I had to get a complete physical for school. I remember the nurse is saying okay this is a complete physical not just a quick checkup. So take off your shirt and pants. So this time I was stripped all the way to my briefs and indeed had a thorough genital exam while laying down. From that point on I always distinguished between a checkup and a physical!

Annual physical, well visit, checkup. its all a matter of semantics. I get a yearly complete head to toe exam (genitalia obviously included - hence the wording complete head to toe). The only time I have had less than a complete exam is for sick visits (which are extremely rare for me) which are obviously problem focused and thus only focus on the current problem (reason) for the actual visit.

I'm very sensitive to diction, so the distinction actually becomes a turn on for me. For some reason, "checkup" sounds tinged with the blue collar casual amateur doctor approach I prefer. I will often ask play partners if I'm in for a physical or a checkup.