Subra: Health Ministry to negotiate with IJN for services

KUALA LUMPUR: The Health Ministry is planning to start negotiating a yearly package of services with the National Heart Institute (IJN) instead of the current paying fee-for-service, said its minister.

Datuk Seri Dr S. Subramaniam said that the ministry has been instructed to move away from the current scheme and become a negotiator-purchaser of services from IJN.

“The purchase will be at a cost which is mutually agreed,” he said at the 4th IJN Research Day themed “Research: The Way for Tomorrow’s Progress yesterday”.

Dr Subramaniam said currently, the ministry sends its patients to IJN and IJN would treat and bill the ministry for payment.

Under the new scheme, they will negotiate, for instance, the cost for bypass treatment, he said.

“This could cost the same as Serdang Hospital or only slightly more based on the case mix we have.

“Then, no one can complain that the cost of treating a patient in IJN is two to three times higher than in Serdang Hospital, because we have negotiated for a deal,” he said.

In conjunction with IJN’s 25th anniversary this year, Dr Subramaniam said that there was a need for IJN to relook its role as a provider of services for ordinary Malaysians besides providing healthcare for private and international patients and serving as a centre of excellence and research.

He said that such negotiations were not new as other countries, such as Japan and Taiwan have also negotiated purchases of medical services from the private sector.

On whether there would be a cap on patients’ treatment referred to IJN, the institute’s chief executive officer Datuk Seri Dr Mohd Azhari Yakub said the discussion with the ministry was still at an early stage and he did not want to pre-empt the minister’s plan.

“As of now, the current (fee-forservice) agreement still stands,” he said.

On whether this would affect patients who require more complex treatment that is costlier, Dr Mohd Azhari said it would depend on the details of the negotiation.

“We will wait for the outcome of the negotiation.

“If the quantum is small, we will be unable to do high risk cases but if the deal is reasonable, it will cover high risk patients,” he said.