Mole Removal Without Insurance Cost?

The cost of mole removal like other cosmetic surgery varies considerably across the country and even in the same area. South Florida tends to have lower fees then more expensive areas such as New York or Los Angeles. We charge starting at $150 for mole removal.

Most plastic usrgeons would wave the office consultation fee if you did all three moles together and charge you just for the excisions. The total in general is around $500-600. Depending on the history and the appearance of the moles you may desire not to have them examined by pathology if the likelihood is that they are benign, but most people want them microscopically examined.

In the 1990's the federal goverment decided to really sock it to the uninsured. They passed something called CLIA 89. This created a monopoly for the large laboratories. It became much more difficult for individual dermatologists to read their own slides. Not surprisingly, ( and while it is not expected that Congressmen be cognizant of medical practice..they should have taken Economics 101) this monopoly has driven up prices. No longer can a dermtologist offer pathology at no cost or a markedly reduced cost, but everything has to be sent off to pathology at a substanial increase.
The fees in our office would be $200 ( $90 for the office visit and $110 for the excisions). However, we must send the specimens off to pathology and their fees would run somewhere around $400.
However, you might offer to pay the dermatologist the pathology fee, and ask him/her to send it to a less expensive lab and have the lab bill the dermatologist.
If I were uninsured I would be pretty mad that the government was so in the pocket to the lab corporations that they passed this measure.