Greater Transparency In Hospital Fees

04 Oct 2002

In response to media queries, Mr Lim Hng Kiang, Minister for Health, said that he supports the call by Mr Yeo Guat Kwang and Dr Michael Lim for more transparency and better disclosure of hospital fees, and more comprehensive financial counselling in our hospitals. He supports the call for hospitals to make their fees more transparent to their patients and the public. This will allow members of the public who need to seek medical treatment to make more informed decisions with regards to their choice of healthcare provider and ward class.

Mr Lim explained that with the DRG system in place, the Ministry of Health has been collecting data on charges for the different types of hospital procedures, both for the public hospitals as well as the private hospitals. Going forward, the Ministry aims to make information on hospital fees in both the public and private sector more easily accessible and user-friendly to the public. For greater transparency, the fees should:

(a). Indicate the estimated total charges (including the doctor?s fees) that the patient is likely to incur for a particular episode of care. The current practice of providing average bill size per day would be refined to better reflect the different types and complexity of treatment.

(b) Provide itemised charges so that patients know exactly what they are paying for.

Mr Lim said that he is prepared to make this data available to CASE or to a panel set up by CASE to audit and verify the data. The Ministry is prepared to collaborate with CASE and help co-fund the setting up of the necessary framework to enable the public to have timely and reliable information on hospital fees. The Ministry is, in particular, keen to work with CASE to:

(a). gather, verify and audit information on hospital fees

(b). explore how this information can be made easily understandable to members of the public

(c). explore ways to make this information as accessible to the public as possible (eg CASE?s website etc). This information would also be provided to patients during financial counseling in the hospitals.

The Ministry of Health has already made it mandatory, under the Private Hospitals and Medical Clinics (PHMC) Regulations, for all hospitals to provide financial counseling to their patients prior to or upon admission. During counseling, patients are provided information on the estimated total bill for patient?s hospitalisation, comparative information on the average bill size per day at the various public and private hospitals, and information on the use of Medisave and MediShield, including financial assistance schemes available like Medifund. Mr Lim said that he supports Dr Michael Lim's call for the financial counselling process to be strengthened and rigorously followed. Patients should have a reasonably good idea what their bill size would look like and be provided with detail of itemised charges for the medical condition that they are admitted for.