Patients, beware of medical chicanery
PERHAPS the most disconcerting aspect of private healthcare is the cost. Compounding this is the fact that most patients are lay people, with relatively little or no understanding of medical jargon.
Patients subject themselves to the expertise of the attending physician or specialist as the case might be, and quite often return home none the better or wiser.
But, beware: your rights as a paying patient to be informed every step of the way as to what you are being treated for, why and how, whether you are a cash paying patient or are covered by medical insurance, are sacrosanct. Questioning a doctor can be a dicey situation for the patient. Many are intimidated by the qualification or the knowledge of the person attending to them – and are in awe.
Do not be. You may irk a doctor or raise his ire and irritation upon questioning or querying the treatment or impending procedures – but do not be afraid to do so. Those patients who are on medical aid do not really question their bills and assume claims submitted are proper, valid and were specifically designed for treatments in the interests of the patient and that the medical aid will pay as claimed. You will be unpleasantly surprised.
More especially in private hospitals, while an admitting doctor may be the initial practitioner attending to the patient, you will on closer inspection find that there may be times when other specialists of other disciplines are being roped in as a “team” to attend to the patient, when in fact it may not even be necessary.
These are colleagues who share suites in the same private hospital and are friends of the admitting doctor.
Even if the use of another specialist is not necessary, it can happen that the “team” will assist one another – even for a cursory consultation – and refer a colleague who adds no benefit for the specific treatment, who will bill the patient and make suggestions which the initial doctor could have easily done with ease.
A five-minute consultation in the ward to see if a patient is “okay” does not justify a full consultation fee at all, no matter how much we may want to argue the concept of expertise.
And the hospital bill continues to rise. And here is the fun part – once your limits on the medical aid run out, your imminent discharge is a fait accompli and your well being is suddenly confirmed with a notice to see the doctor in a few months – when funds are reinstated.
Without painting all doctors with the same brush, if you are not alert or do not have the courage to question, then you may find that you yield to the world of the unknown controlled by the apparently erudite and knowledgeable who may not necessarily only have your health care in their hands, but also one eye on the cash register and a holiday on the French Riviera or the Bahamas.