A friend of mine has been complaining of intestinal pain. She went to the free doctor but he just gave her some painkillers and sent her away. She thinks she needs to have an endoscopy, which seems reasonable to me - I'm no doctor but it does sound like it could be coeliac disease. She doesn't expect to get an endoscopy from the previous guy because he was so dismissive last time, but she can get one done privately. I am happy to cover the cost of this but what I don't want to do is shift the management of what could be a long term condition into the private system when most of it could be dealt with in the state system. If she pitches up at a private hospital and gets an endoscopy there, will she then be stuck in the private system, or can the results be passed back to the public hospital?

If it is intestinal pain then I don't think she needs endoscopy? I've done it in private hospital but for my acid reflux. 15k baht. 

 

Why not simply do ultrasound? 

Go to a private gastroenterologist.  You pay out of pocket for private.  It does not effect her status in government hospitals.
Don't mess around.  The mother of a friend of our family complained of stomach issues and back pain.  The government hospital sent her to massage therapy.  Shortly after she was in enough pain that they doctors took her serious.  She had stage 4 intestinal cancer.  She was dead in two weeks.  A blessing from our perspective.  Government hospitals can be slow at diagnosis.  Consult a private gastroenterologist.  Consultations are cheap.  Best of luck.

Can't tell you enough to go private.

My wife had some stomach issues (thankfully not serious). The 30baht Doc told her she was stressed and sent her away with some paracetamol! You get what you pay for I suppose

 

Doctor in private clinic can give her medical referral(sorry if not correct in english) to do endoscopy in public hospital! That kind private clinic ( if famous for that kind pain  locals know whitch clinic) , cost about 1000-2000 bth/visit. 

It is no problem st all to have tests done in a private hospital and then bring the results to the public hospital (in case if scan or endoscopy get it on CD). 

 

Celiac disease is extemely rare in Thais and is almost certainly not her issue. 

from personal experience I can recommend
Surgical Endoscopy Chulalongkorn Hospital
They have a FB page.

I had an endoscopy here about 5 years ago at a private hospital, cost was about 16k Thai bts, the hospital had obviously been to the USA to see how to bill patients! Everything was itemized from the room I started in, 500bts, this is Mr xxx who take in a wheelchair to another room 30 m away, 500 bts etc and then just when I thought it was all over on top of the 16k the prescription from the in house pharmacy added another third ! So be prepared, find a private hospital that can do the job without ripping you off.