PGH to Increase Rates Next Month

OR fee Union’s prime concern

By Christian V. Esguerra
Inquirer
Posted date: January 05, 2007

THE PHILIPPINE GENERAL HOSPITAL, the “teaching hospital” of the University of the Philippines system, is set to increase rates this year, raising concern from its own employees.

The PGH employees union said the planned increases, particularly those involving operating room and patient identification cards, could be too much for charity patients.

Union president Jossel Ebesate said a December announcement showed that the price of the “blue card,” a patient’s identification card, would rise from P7 to P15. Patients would also pay P1,500 in operating room (OR) fee, through the Philippine Health Insurance Corp. , the government health insurance program, said Ebesate, a nurse and the secretary general of the Alliance of Health Workers. He said the rate adjustment was scheduled to take effect next month.

Ebesate said the union was concerned primarily about the new fee for the operating room. Dr. Michael Tee, PGH spokesperson, said yesterday the adjustments were carefully studied by the hospital’s rates committee that included union members. The committee meets Jan. 9 to discuss the various concerns. “At the PGH, everything is democratic,” he added. Ebesate said even if the new OR fee was to be paid by Philhealth, many charity patients were not covered by it. This means they will have to pay the P1,500, “no small amount for indigent patients,” he said.

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