Reports highlights need for private hospitals
This is one of several findings contained in a major report on the growing demand for private hospital services in the Cork region.
Its findings completely contradict VHI claims that there is no additional requirement for private in-patient or daycare beds in the area.
The report, commissioned by the Mater Private, which wants to develop a 100-bed private hospital on the outskirts of the city, found:
* “Very significant gaps” in private hospital provision of cancer, cardiac and orthopaedic services for people with private health insurance (PHI) living in Cork, Kerry, Limerick, Waterford and Tipperary.
* The region will need more than 400 new private hospital in-patient beds to cope with predicted demand by 2026.
* PHI members in the region are heavily reliant on struggling public hospitals for these services.
* They have not benefited from investment in the private hospital sector in Dublin and Galway over the last decade
* As a result, they are getting less value for money than those with PHI who live in Dublin and Galway
The report examined orthopaedics — the third largest VHI Healthcare spend category — and said it is the speciality most often cited by doctors as a striking example of the limitations of private healthcare services in the Cork region.
It found waiting times in this speciality for PHI members in the private system appear to be longer than for public hospitals.
“They are more than six months in the case of two private hospital consultants, according to PwC research undertaken in August 2011,” the report said. “Previously in the public system, waiting times of this duration would have triggered National Treatment Purchase Fund eligibility. They are reportedly unheard of among PHI members in Dublin or Galway.”
It said “an exceptionally small complement” of orthopaedic surgeons at the private Bon Secours Hospital in Cork appears to be a factor in these delays.
It said there is no private provision for spinal surgery in Cork, which contrasts starkly with the situation in Dublin where seven private hospitals provide this service, as does the Galway clinic.
The researchers surveyed 131 GPs in the region who said PHI members in the area experience delays in accessing outpatient, inpatient and day hospital services. A total of 95% of the GPs said they would welcome new private hospital operators in the region.
The report, which was delivered to Mater Private last August, also said a strong sense emerged private hospitals in Cork are “less engaged” in the provision of complex care to PHI members than other private hospitals around the country.
The Cork Medical Centre, the first private hospital to open in Cork for decades, was forced to close last September, with the loss of 75 jobs, after VHI refused to provide cover to the operator.
The Mater Private has applied to reopen the facility as the Mater Private Cork but it has also been refused cover by the Vhi.
