February 2019 Issue 108
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INDEPENDENT PRACTITIONER TODAY
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PRODUCT GUIDE 2019
The business journal for doctors in private practice
In this issue
Smooth the path to your door Make sure you gain and retain your patients by following these three simple steps P16
Zoom your practice into the 21st century
An app is revolutionising the way patients access GP services P20
Start of fee disclosures By Robin Stride The private healthcare sector’s new age of fee transparency, now well underway, is being welcomed by consultants’ representatives. Specialists have started to be con tacted by the Private Healthcare Information Network (PHIN) to enable them to meet the new requirement to publish the typical fees they charge patients when offering private treatment or con sultations. Hospitals are meanwhile being encouraged to support patient choice and sign up to price trans parency. The ‘fees for all’ requirement has finally arrived after years of plan ning and argument following an investigation by the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA), which found a lack of transparency in the charges patients can expect to pay for private care. A 2015 landmark judgment from the Competition Appeal Tribunal paved the way for all consultants’ fees to be compulsorily published. The Independent Doctors Fed eration (IDF) told Independent Practitioner Today: ‘The require ment to publish fees has been man dated and we would encourage our In association with
members to enter the required data as soon as possible. ‘We endorse the need for trans parency and recognise that this is just one step in ensuring that patients are fully informed to be able to make decisions in selecting a care provider.’ PHIN is the CMA-mandated ‘information organisation’ respon sible for publishing independent information for patients on safety, quality and costs in private health care. Last month it began the pro cess of contacting all consultants treating privately-funded patients in the UK. They were asked to pro vide the typical fees they charge self-pay patients. Dr Andrew Vallance-Owen, PHIN chairman, said: ‘For as long as I’ve been involved in private health care, the fees patients can expect to pay have not always been clear. ‘Patients should be at the centre of their care, yet, along the way, a convoluted and unclear system of fees, par ticularly for self-pay patients, has developed. We owe it to patients to rectify this by being transparent about charges. ‘PHIN has made this as simple as possible by allowing consultants to insert a range to cover the typical fees patients can expect to pay. This
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When safety is critical
Our series on eliminating human error looks at how highly reliable organisations prioritise safety P28
A HEAD FOR FIGURES Cosmetic surgeon Miss Sherina Balaratnam picked up a prize at the Aesthetics Awards. Find out in which sphere she was voted outstanding by turning to the full story on page 7
will not be an exact science, but represents an important step in creating a more patient-focused industry.’ PHIN said impact from the lack of clear information about price was particularly felt by those selffunding their care. They were also t he most vulnerable to any changes in cost arising from esca lations in clinical need. CMA director Adam Land said both patients and doctors will ben efit. ‘Patients will have the infor mation they need to choose the services they can afford, and con sultants will be able to have more informed conversations with them about the cost of treatment.’ Neil Huband, from the Private Patients Forum, said: ‘The ability of a patient to be able to compare the performance of a doctor or a hospital with others, and also to be able to compare costs, is essen tial. Moreover, it should be the right of every patient.’ n See page 11
FEE VISIBILITY Over 1,600 consultants already appearing on PHIN’s website – where information on the scope of the treatment they provide is shown alongside the average length of stay for their patients following treatment – are the first to be invited to submit fees. Thousands of other specialists will be contacted by the end of March and PHIN aims to publish this information for patients on its website from April. To ensure the information is clear and useful for patients, hospitals are also being invited to submit their ‘inclusive package’ prices – where the consultant’s fee is rolled into the hospital’s charges and presented as a single cost to the patient. PHIN said this would enable it to provide patients with a complete view of the price they can expect to pay.