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Friends: My mother who has PD recently went to see a physician in NYC at NYU re a pallidotomy. The doctor told them that prior to doing the surgery he would require that she submit herself to four full days of testing. At some point after the testing, a decision would be made as to whether he would do the surgery on her -- at all. I have been reading the messages of others on this network who have had the surgery and I have never heard of such extensive (expensive) testing being done. My folks spoke with a doctor at Mass Genereal who does the operation and his testing regime seems much less complicated, lengthy and arbitrary. A second concern has to do with insurance. Perhaps others have run into this. Apparently, Medicare is the primary provider and Blue Cross/Shield is the secondary. According to the docotr, Medicare won't pay for the pallidotomy as it is experimental surgery. BC/BS won't pay because the prinmary provider turned down coverage. This doesn't exactly make sense to me although our system of health care never did . . . I'd appreciate any thoughts, observations, etc. Thanks. Andrew and Meredith