Online registry will monitor accessory fees
An online registry has been established by a Montreal community health clinic to monitor violations of the ban imposed last week on supplementary, or accessory, fees by doctors in private offices or clinics.
Accessory fees obliged patients to pay out of their pockets for certain services and materials used in procedures performed outside hospital — among them colonoscopies, mammograms, childhood vaccinations and drops used in eye examinations.
Since Jan. 26, it has been illegal for doctors to charge accessory fees for services covered by the province’s health-insurance board, the Régie de l’assurance maladie du Québec (RAMQ), which remunerates doctors and administers the public health and prescription drug insurance plans. Health minister Gaétan Barrette has warned doctors contravening the ban could face sanctions.
Representatives of the Fight for Health committee of the Pointe-St-Charles community clinic, who introduced the new registry at a news conference on Sunday, are asking patients to report any illegal charges, said Stéphane Defoy, a community organizer at the clinic. The online forms are available in English and in French. The Pointe-St-Charles community clinic has long been opposed to accessory fees on the ground they limit access to health care, particularly for those with low incomes.
Tentative eleventh-hour deals on how they would be compensated for the lost income were reached late last week with Quebec’s family doctors and specialists, many of whom had expressed strong opposition to the ban. A chart on the provincial health ministry’s website outlines what doctors may and may no longer bill patients for in their private offices and clinics.
“It is a victory that accessory fees have been abolished, but we need to remain vigilant,” said Defoy, who expressed concern the ban could lead to an increase in administrative fees for filling out forms for patients or photocopying patient files. administrative fees are not considered accessory fees and doctors are permitted to continue to charge them.
The Pointe-St-Charles clinic established an online registry in 2015 on which patients could document instances of being obliged to pay accessory fees.
More than 700 patients submitted data to the registry, which was shut down last Friday in anticipation of the new registry’s launch, Defoy said.
Others supporting to the registry initiative announced on Sunday include the Médecins Québécois pour le régime public, which was in favour of the abolition of accessory fees when it was announced by Barrette last fall, the Confédération des syndicats nationaux, and the law firm of Grenier Verbauwhede, which is in the process of trying to launch a class-action suit against the Quebec health ministry, RAMQ and three medical clinics for the levying of accessory fees.