After 5 cancelled ops, we had to go private
i WaS interested in the suggestion that you can have a cataract operation in Spain for a lot less than £8,000 with the benefit of a week’s five-star holiday thrown in (letters). When my daughter Zena was a teenager, she was unable to eat because of a deteriorating jaw condition. The local nHS hospital in Orpington cancelled corrective surgery five times over a year because the appointed specialists had resigned or were not available. in desperation, i borrowed money from friends and relatives to pay for a £3,000 private operation. Zena was operated on privately by the specialist who had resigned just before her first scheduled operation. i asked Orpington Hospital to pay the bill, but they refused. i requested an independent review without success. i then applied for a High Court judicial review contesting Orpington Hospital’s refusal to pay the costs of the surgery. at the hearing, the judge refused my claim because, as my daughter had been treated in the UK, the costs of the private surgery were down to me. if she had been operated on abroad, i might have been entitled to demand payment from the nHS. i wish i’d known that before i’d paid for the surgery as i could have saved a lot of money and my family would have enjoyed a five-star holiday abroad.
LEE JOHNSON, Dagenham, Essex. THe claim that a private cataract operation in the UK costs £8,000 has to be nonsense. i came over from Spain to have mine done privately, and my insurance company paid the bill. it was £800 for both eyes.
SHIELA PECZENIK, Correos Pollensa, Majorca. WHY does Weakest link TV presenter anne Robinson spend thousands on hearing aids (Mail)? My nHS pair are brilliant. My audiologist told me that another patient paid £3,000 for hearing aids and then requested nHS back-ups. They were the same model. NIGEL BLAIr, Willingdon, E. Sussex.