Efforts on to restore cashless insurance facility

Concerned over the plight of patients after withdrawal of the cashless treatment facility by some hospitals at the behest of PSU insurance firms, noted heart surgeon Naresh Trehan on Monday said all-out efforts are underway to resolve the issue.

The public sector insurance companies had taken off from July 1 about 150 hospitals from the list of Preferred Provider Network (PPN) that provide cashless hospitalisation services to policy holders under the mediclaim scheme.

"Patents are suffering because of the problem. We are holding meetings with different stakeholders to resolve the issue," Trehan, who is also the chairman of the CII Healthcare Council.

Pointing out that the cashless treatment in certain hospitals have been withdrawn only by the four PSU insurance companies, Trehan said several meetings between the insurers and the healthcare service providers have been held.

"We would be meeting them again to resolve the issue," he said. He said another meeting is being held in Mumbai on Tuesday.

The four insurance companies -- New India Assurance, United India Insurance, National Insurance and Oriental Insurance -- are believed to have stopped the cashless service because of alleged over-billing by some private hospitals.

Narottam Puri, a noted ENT specialist and member of Ficci's committee on health services, described the steps taken by the PSU insurance companies as 'retrograde'.

He questioned how the best private hospitals in the country could suddenly become bad and taken out of the network of entities providing cashless treatment facility to insured persons.

On the allegations of over-billing, Puri said: "These issues can be sorted out across the table."