The doctor is giving a referral or a prescription for a patient in order to gather detailed information about his/her state of health and to make a diagnose based on further imaging examination.

Self-referrals are available for those who want to investigate their state of health without a prior medical examination at their own expense. Patients must be aged 18 or above and take a safety questionnaire before, in order to see if the CT scanning is appropriate or safe for them.

Some precautions must be taken (for instance, X-rays should be avoided by pregnant women and by people who had another examination recently).

Children should be scanned only in cases they really need the examination, and so should the adults. The cancer risk from the CT scan radiations is low, but it can increase in time as there is more and more accessibility for self-referral examinations.