VHI review recovers €20m

Around €20m was recovered by the VHI’s special investigations unit and medical review process last year, it has emerged.

Chairman designate of the VHI Liam Downey told the Oireachtas Committee on Health and Children that more widespread use of “data analytics” by the special investigations unit had been very effective.

“More incidences of inappropriate billing have been identified, potential patterns spotted, incidences of over-utilisation identified and also an increase in pre-payment and post-payment validation calls have delivered additional savings over the past number of years,” said Mr Downey.

He said a key element of the insurers’ cost containment strategy had been to identify ways of doing things smarter and better — not just cutting costs.

“One of the best examples of this is the Vhi HomeCare service which we began in 2010. This has delivered excellent results, treating 3,000 patients, saving 40,000 hospital bed days and delivering savings of €13.5m for our customers.”

Mr Downey said the service that was consultant-led allowed their customers to receive high-quality care in the comfort of their own home.

He said the VHI was doing everything possible to ensure patients were treated in the most appropriate and lowest cost setting and there were more opportunities for that in the future.

In 2013 the VHI announced it had recorded a surplus after tax of €65m — a profit margin of 4.4% that was in line with the industry norm. It also improved its solvency ratio and maintained a low operating-cost ratio.

“2014 was another good year for the company and the annual results will be issued in the next couple of months,” said Mr Downey.

He said the VHI had 90 policies on offer and that was as a result of increased competition on the health insurance market.

“In the earlier days when we didn’t have competition we had just a handful of policies — four or five,” said Mr Downey.