Banner Health Annual Wellness Review

What the Banner Health Annual Wellness Review Actually Covers

If you’re between 40 and 65 and you’ve been putting off a checkup because you feel fine — that’s exactly the problem. Feeling fine doesn’t mean nothing’s happening. The Banner Health Annual Wellness Review exists to catch the stuff you can’t feel yet. High blood pressure. Prediabetes. Early kidney changes. Cholesterol creeping into dangerous territory. These don’t send you a warning text. They just build quietly until something breaks.

Banner Health is one of the largest nonprofit health systems in the western United States. They operate across six states with more than 30 hospitals. Their annual wellness review is designed around Medicare’s Annual Wellness Visit framework, but it’s available — in various forms — to patients on commercial insurance plans too. The visit typically lasts 30 to 60 minutes. It’s not a full physical exam. That’s the part most people misunderstand. It’s a health risk assessment. A conversation. A screening roadmap.

During a Banner Health Annual Wellness Review, a provider will usually go through your medical history, update your medication list, check your vitals (blood pressure, heart rate, BMI), screen for depression, assess fall risk if you’re over 65, and build or update a personalized prevention plan. They may order lab work. They may not. It depends on your age, sex, risk factors, and insurance.

That last part matters more than people think. What gets ordered — and what you pay for — varies wildly depending on your plan. Medicare patients often pay $0 for the wellness visit itself. But if the doctor orders bloodwork or refers you for imaging during that same visit, those can be billed separately. A 2025 Kaiser Family Foundation report found that 1 in 4 adults who attended a wellness visit were surprised by a bill afterward. The visit was free. The extras were not.

What Tests Can Be Done with Annual Wellness?

This is the question people type into Google at 11 p.m. when they can’t sleep. What tests can be done with annual wellness? The answer depends on your provider, your insurance, and your age bracket — but here’s a realistic breakdown of what’s commonly included or recommended during or alongside a Banner Health Annual Wellness Review.

Standard Screenings Typically Included

Blood pressure measurement is always part of it. Body mass index calculation too. Depression screening using a PHQ-2 or PHQ-9 questionnaire. Cognitive assessment for patients over 65. Vision screening. A review of your immunization schedule — flu, shingles, pneumonia, updated COVID boosters, Tdap.

For patients aged 40 to 65, providers frequently recommend or order these labs:

Complete metabolic panel (CMP): This checks your blood sugar, kidney function, electrolytes, and liver enzymes. Fourteen markers in one blood draw. If your fasting glucose comes back between 100 and 125 mg/dL, you’re in prediabetic range. Over 126 on two separate tests and you’re looking at a diabetes diagnosis. According to the CDC, 97.6 million American adults have prediabetes. Most don’t know it.

Lipid panel: Total cholesterol, LDL, HDL, triglycerides. The American Heart Association recommends adults over 20 get this checked every four to six years, and more often after 40 or if you have risk factors like family history, obesity, or smoking.

Complete blood count (CBC): Detects anemia, infection markers, and blood disorders. It’s cheap and informative. Most insurance plans cover it as part of preventive care.

Thyroid-stimulating hormone (TSH): Especially important for women over 40. Hypothyroidism affects roughly 5% of Americans over 12, per the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases. Fatigue, weight gain, brain fog — these symptoms get blamed on aging when the thyroid is actually the problem.

Screenings That May Require Separate Orders or Referrals

Colonoscopy: The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force updated their recommendation in 2021 to begin colorectal cancer screening at age 45, down from 50. Banner Health follows this guideline. If you’re 45 or older and haven’t had one, your provider will likely bring it up during the wellness review. The procedure itself is done separately — often at a Banner outpatient facility — and is covered at no cost under most ACA-compliant plans when done for screening purposes.

Mammography: For women, typically recommended annually or biennially starting at age 40. Banner Health has dedicated breast health centers in Arizona and Colorado with same-week scheduling in many locations.

Low-dose CT lung screening: For adults aged 50 to 80 with a 20-pack-year smoking history who currently smoke or quit within the last 15 years. This catches lung cancer early, when survival rates are dramatically higher. Five-year survival for stage I lung cancer is around 63%. Stage IV drops to about 7%.

A1C test: If your fasting glucose is borderline, your provider may order this to get a three-month average of blood sugar levels. An A1C of 5.7% to 6.4% indicates prediabetes.

Prostate-specific antigen (PSA): For men, the decision to screen is now a shared one between patient and provider. Banner Health providers typically discuss PSA screening with men starting at age 50, or age 40 to 45 if you’re Black or have a first-degree relative with prostate cancer.

What the Banner Health Annual Wellness Review Does Not Include

This trips people up. The wellness review is not a head-to-toe physical examination. Your provider won’t typically perform a detailed cardiac exam, palpate your abdomen, check your reflexes, or examine your skin mole by mole. If you want a traditional physical — the kind where a doctor actually puts hands on you and checks everything — you need to schedule that separately. Banner Health offers it, but it’s billed as an office visit, not a preventive wellness visit. That means copays, deductibles, and coinsurance apply.

The wellness review also doesn’t include dental screenings, hearing tests (unless you report hearing loss), or specialized cardiac testing like stress tests or echocardiograms. Those require referrals and are billed under diagnostic codes.

A woman named Karen — 52, living in Mesa, Arizona — shared her experience on a Banner Health community forum in late 2025. She scheduled her annual wellness visit thinking she’d get “the works.” Blood drawn, EKG, the whole thing. What she got was a 25-minute conversation, a blood pressure reading, and a list of recommended screenings she’d need to schedule separately. She wasn’t upset with Banner. She was upset with her own expectations. “I didn’t know the difference between a wellness visit and a physical,” she wrote. “Now I do.”

How Much Does a Banner Health Annual Wellness Review Cost?

For Medicare Part B beneficiaries, the Annual Wellness Visit is covered at 100% with no copay or deductible — as long as you’ve had Part B for more than 12 months and haven’t had a wellness visit in the past 12 months. The first year, it’s called the “Welcome to Medicare” preventive visit. After that, it’s the Annual Wellness Visit.

For people on employer-sponsored or marketplace insurance, it gets murkier. Under the ACA, most plans must cover certain preventive services at no cost. But the Annual Wellness Visit — as Medicare defines it — is a Medicare-specific benefit. Private insurers offer their own versions. Banner Health accepts most major insurers, including Aetna, Blue Cross Blue Shield, Cigna, UnitedHealthcare, and Humana. Your plan may call it an “annual preventive exam” or “yearly checkup.” Coverage and out-of-pocket costs vary.

Without insurance, a basic wellness-style visit at Banner Health can run between $150 and $350 depending on the location and provider. Lab work on top of that can add $100 to $500. A lipid panel alone typically costs $30 to $50 at a lab like Quest or Labcorp. A CMP runs about the same. But at a hospital-affiliated lab — which Banner uses — prices are often higher because of facility fees.

The Facility Fee Problem

Banner Health operates many of its clinics as hospital outpatient departments. That means when you walk into what looks like a regular doctor’s office, you might be billed a facility fee on top of the provider fee. This is legal. It’s also frustrating. A 2024 report from the Health Care Cost Institute found that facility fees added an average of $280 to outpatient visits at hospital-owned practices compared to independent clinics. If cost is a concern — and for most people between 40 and 65, it is — ask upfront whether the Banner location you’re visiting charges a facility fee.

Alternatives to Banner Health for Annual Exams

Banner Health isn’t your only option. Not even close. And depending on what you’re looking for — lower cost, less hassle, faster results, or just a different approach — some of these alternatives to Banner Health for annual exams might actually fit your life better.

Direct Primary Care (DPC) Clinics

DPC clinics charge a flat monthly fee — usually $50 to $150 — and give you unlimited access to a primary care provider. No insurance billing. No copays. No facility fees. Many DPC practices include basic lab work in the membership. You can find DPC clinics in most metro areas where Banner operates, including Phoenix, Tucson, Denver, and Greeley. The DPC Frontier database lists over 1,800 practices nationwide as of early 2026.

A 47-year-old software engineer in Chandler, Arizona — let’s call him David — switched from Banner to a DPC clinic in 2025. He pays $99 a month. His provider spends 30 to 45 minutes per visit. Lab work for a CBC, CMP, lipid panel, and A1C cost him $0 extra. At Banner, his previous year’s labs had been billed at $387 after insurance. “I’m not anti-Banner,” he said in a Reddit thread. “I just wanted something simpler.”

At-Home Health Testing Kits

Companies like Everlywell, LetsGetChecked, and Paloma Health now sell CLIA-certified at-home blood test kits. You prick your finger or use a small blood draw device, mail the sample, and get results — reviewed by a licensed physician — within days. Prices range from $49 for a single panel to $299 for comprehensive packages.

These aren’t a replacement for a full clinical evaluation. But for health-conscious adults who want to monitor key biomarkers between annual visits, they’re practical. LetsGetChecked, for example, offers a men’s health panel and a women’s health panel that cover cholesterol, liver function, testosterone or hormone levels, and diabetes markers. The results come with a phone consultation from a nurse.

Accuracy is a fair concern. A 2023 study published in the Journal of Applied Laboratory Medicine found that finger-prick samples had a 93% concordance rate with venipuncture for common metabolic markers. Not perfect. But close enough to flag trends and catch early changes.

Community Health Centers and Federally Qualified Health Centers (FQHCs)

FQHCs serve patients regardless of ability to pay. Fees are on a sliding scale based on income. There are over 1,400 FQHCs across the U.S. with nearly 15,000 service delivery sites. In Arizona alone — Banner’s home turf — there are more than 200 FQHC locations. These centers provide full physicals, preventive screenings, immunizations, lab work, and chronic disease management. Wait times can be longer. Provider continuity can be inconsistent. But the cost barrier is almost nonexistent.

Retail Clinics: CVS MinuteClinic, Walgreens Health, Walmart Health

Note: Walmart Health closed all 51 of its locations in 2024. So scratch that one. But CVS MinuteClinic and Walgreens Health clinics still offer preventive screenings, basic lab work, and wellness visits. Prices for a wellness screening at MinuteClinic start around $139 without insurance. They accept most major plans. The visits are fast — 15 to 20 minutes — and walk-in friendly. You won’t get the depth of a full primary care visit. But for a blood pressure check, basic metabolic panel, or A1C screening, they get the job done.

Telehealth-First Primary Care

Platforms like One Medical (now part of Amazon), PlushCare, and Sesame offer virtual wellness visits. One Medical charges $199 per year for membership plus insurance billing for visits. Sesame lets you book visits starting at $30 with no insurance required. These work well for the “I hate sitting in waiting rooms” crowd. Lab orders can be sent to a local Quest or Labcorp. Results are reviewed over a video call. For someone between 40 and 65 who wants regular monitoring without the friction of a traditional office visit, telehealth-first models are worth exploring.

How to Get the Most Out of Any Annual Wellness Review

Whether you stick with Banner Health or try something different, the wellness visit itself only works if you show up prepared. Here’s what that looks like.

Bring a Current Medication List

Every prescription. Every supplement. Every over-the-counter thing you take regularly — ibuprofen, melatonin, fish oil, whatever. Write down the dose and how often you take it. Providers can’t assess drug interactions or adjust plans if they’re working off incomplete information.

Know Your Family Medical History

Specifically: heart disease, cancer (type and age at diagnosis), diabetes, stroke, and mental health conditions in first-degree relatives (parents, siblings, children). This directly affects which screenings your provider recommends and when. A family history of colon cancer in a parent under 60, for example, means your screening colonoscopy should start 10 years before the age your parent was diagnosed — or at 40, whichever comes first.

Write Down Your Questions Before the Visit

People forget things under fluorescent lights while wearing a paper gown. Write it down. Common questions worth asking at a Banner Health Annual Wellness Review: Should I be screened for sleep apnea? Is my blood pressure trending in the wrong direction? Am I due for a bone density scan? Should I get a hepatitis C screening? (The USPSTF recommends it for all adults aged 18 to 79.) What does my 10-year cardiovascular risk look like?

Request a Copy of All Lab Results

Don’t just accept “everything looks normal.” Ask for the actual numbers. A fasting glucose of 99 is technically normal. But it’s one point away from prediabetic range. If it was 88 two years ago, that’s a trend your provider might not mention unless you ask. Track your own numbers over time. A simple spreadsheet works. So does the Banner Health patient portal, which provides digital access to lab results, visit summaries, and immunization records.

Why Proactive Monitoring Matters More After 40

Between 40 and 65, your body shifts in ways that don’t announce themselves loudly. Muscle mass declines about 3% to 8% per decade after 30. Bone density starts dropping, especially in postmenopausal women. Insulin sensitivity decreases. Blood vessels stiffen. The lens of your eye thickens, which is why everyone suddenly needs reading glasses at 44.

These are normal biological processes. They’re also the exact conditions that, if unmonitored, lead to preventable disease. Type 2 diabetes. Osteoporosis. Cardiovascular disease. The American Diabetes Association estimates that 8.7 million Americans had undiagnosed diabetes in 2021. That’s not people ignoring their symptoms. That’s people who didn’t have symptoms yet.

The Banner Health Annual Wellness Review — or any version of an annual wellness check — is supposed to intercept these trajectories before they become emergencies. The challenge is that the system isn’t designed for hand-holding. You have to advocate for yourself. You have to ask for the labs. You have to track the trends. You have to follow up on the referrals.

A cardiologist at Banner Desert Medical Center in Mesa told a local news outlet in January 2026 that roughly 40% of patients referred for follow-up cardiac screening after a wellness visit never schedule the appointment. The wellness review flagged a potential issue. The patient didn’t follow through. That’s not a system failure. That’s a behavior gap — and it’s one you can close by treating the wellness visit as a starting point, not a finish line.

Banner Health’s Digital Tools for Ongoing Monitoring

Banner Health has invested heavily in its digital infrastructure. The Banner Health app and patient portal — powered by Epic’s MyChart — give you access to lab results, appointment scheduling, secure messaging with your provider, prescription refills, and telehealth visits. You can view trends in your vitals over time if your clinic uses connected devices or if you manually input data.

Banner also participates in remote patient monitoring programs for certain chronic conditions. If you’re diagnosed with hypertension during your Banner Health Annual Wellness Review, for example, your provider might enroll you in a home blood pressure monitoring program. You’d receive a Bluetooth-enabled cuff, take daily readings, and the data syncs to your care team. A 2025 Banner internal report (shared during their annual community health update) noted that patients enrolled in remote monitoring had a 22% higher rate of blood pressure control at six months compared to patients receiving standard follow-up care.

For the self-monitoring crowd — the people who track steps, sleep, and heart rate variability on a smartwatch — the Banner portal integrates with Apple Health and some Android health apps. The integration is basic. It won’t pull your Oura ring data directly into your medical chart. But it does allow you to share activity summaries with your provider during visits, which adds context to the clinical picture.

Common Mistakes People Make with Annual Wellness Visits

Scheduling it and thinking the job is done. The visit identifies risks. It doesn’t fix them. If your provider recommends a statin and you never fill the prescription, the visit didn’t help you.

Confusing a wellness visit with a sick visit. If you bring a list of 12 active complaints to a wellness review, the provider will likely need to split it into two appointments — one billed as preventive, one as diagnostic. That second one hits your deductible.

Not fasting before the appointment. If your provider ordered a lipid panel or fasting glucose, you need to fast for 8 to 12 hours beforehand. Water is fine. Black coffee is usually fine. That cream-and-sugar latte at 7 a.m. before your 9 a.m. blood draw will skew your triglycerides and glucose readings.

Ignoring mental health screening. The PHQ-2 and PHQ-9 depression screens are part of most annual wellness visits now. People blow through them. “No, I’m fine.” But depression in midlife is underdiagnosed, especially in men. The National Institute of Mental Health reports that only about half of adults with depression receive treatment. The wellness visit is one of the few structured opportunities to catch it.

Final Thoughts on Taking Control of Your Health Between 40 and 65

The Banner Health Annual Wellness Review is a solid tool if you use it right. Show up informed. Ask for specific labs. Track your numbers year over year. Follow up on referrals. And if Banner doesn’t fit your budget or your preferences, there are real alternatives — DPC clinics, at-home testing, FQHCs, telehealth platforms — that lower the barrier to staying on top of your health without requiring a waiting room or a copay surprise.

Proactive monitoring between 40 and 65 isn’t about fear. It’s about catching the slow-moving stuff while it’s still cheap and easy to manage. A $30 lipid panel now is better than a $150,000 cardiac bypass later. A five-minute depression screen is better than a crisis. A colonoscopy at 45 is better than a stage III diagnosis at 52.

You don’t need to overhaul your life. You just need to show up once a year and pay attention to what the data tells you.

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