Gastroenterology at NHS Highland
Privately, gastroscopy costs much the same wherever you go in Scotland — £2,364–£2,441 across 4 providers.
NHS Highland covers Inverness, Fort William, Oban, Wick, Thurso and Nairn and the surrounding area.
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Waiting on the NHS
Gastroenterology
NHS Highland
How long people currently on the list have waited so far. Someone referred last week counts as a one-week wait, so this reads low too — just less so.
8 weeks
Median wait
Half have waited less than this so far — about 2 months.
50 weeks
90th percentile wait
1 in 10 have already waited longer than this — about a year.
Treat these numbers with caution. They are based on just 4 patients, which is too few to give a reliable median. Boards this small often send patients to a neighbouring board for treatment — ask your GP where you’d actually be referred.
The size of the queue
4 people are waiting here, and 7 were treated in the reporting month. At that rate the existing queue alone takes about 2 weeks to clear.
That’s a floor, not a forecast — it assumes nobody else joins the list, and people join every day.
How does your own wait compare?
A median describes the middle. If you’ve been waiting a long time, it probably describes nothing like your experience.
The whole journey
- GP referral to seeing a specialist
- 23 weeks
- Then being listed to treatment
- 2 weeks
- Roughly, in total
- about 6 months
These two always count people who finished each stage, whichever measure you pick above — a total built from people still queuing would be meaningless, since anyone waiting for treatment finished the first leg long ago. Still two medians from two different groups, so treat it as a rough expectation rather than a prediction. Most waiting time headlines quote only the second figure.
Inpatient and day case figures for June 2026, based on 4 people on the list, published by Public Health Scotland. Derived from banded figures, so they are close estimates rather than exact. Your own wait depends on clinical urgency.
Paying privately
Gastroenterology
Priced as gastroscopy
Priced as a gastroscopy. A colonoscopy is a different procedure and costs more — the two Scottish providers publishing it differ by 67%, which suggests they are not describing the same thing, so it is not quoted here.
£2,364–£2,441
Typical self-pay price range
Package price: the procedure, hospital stay and standard follow-up. What else is covered varies by provider.
Based on 4 providers in Scotland
- Ross Hall Hospital, Glasgow£2,364
- Kings Park Hospital, Stirling£2,364
- Albyn Hospital, Aberdeen£2,394
- Nuffield Health Glasgow Hospital, Glasgow£2,441
These aren’t strictly like-for-like. Nuffield Health Glasgow Hospital doesn’t say either way. Each price links to the page it came from.
Last checked 4 August 2026. Prices are Scotland-wide, not specific to your health board — self-pay patients can be treated at any private hospital. A quote for your own case may fall outside this range.
Median wait: 8 weeks. Typical self-pay cost: £2,364–£2,441.
Based on fewer than 30 patients — see the caution note above.
Paying to find out, rather than paying to fix it
Some people pay privately for a consultation or a scan, then take the results back to the NHS. It costs hundreds rather than thousands, and what it buys is a diagnosis — not a place further up any queue.
Initial consultant appointment
4 providers: Spire Edinburgh Hospitals, Ross Hall Hospital, Albyn Hospital, Kings Park Hospital
£191–£275
Ultrasound scan
1 provider: Nuffield Health Edinburgh Hospital
On the NHS here: 1,351 people waiting, median 12 days, 16% over six weeks.
£330
MRI scan (one area)
2 providers: Nuffield Health Glasgow Hospital, Spire Edinburgh Hospitals
On the NHS here: 1,435 people waiting, median 36 days, 42% over six weeks.
£470–£625
CT scan (one area)
1 provider: Nuffield Health Glasgow Hospital
On the NHS here: 858 people waiting, median 16 days, 16% over six weeks.
£650
NHS diagnostic figures are for NHS Highland as at 2026-03, and count people currently on the list rather than how long completed patients waited. That dataset is published a few months behind the treatment waits above.
A scan does not change your position on the NHS list by itself. What it can do is establish how urgent your case is, and urgency is what determines priority. Whether a private result is accepted, and what happens next, is a matter for your GP and your health board — ask them before spending anything. Scan prices usually exclude the consultant appointment needed to refer you and to interpret the result.