A call to “name and shame” local hospital consultants who are costing the HSE West millions of euros by failing to sign off on private health insurance claims has been rejected by the health authority.
The bid by outspoken City Mayor and chairperson of the health authority’s regional health forum Cllr Padraig Conneely failed this week when management said specific consultants are not named in relation to the processing of claims for data protection reasons.
The Fine Gael councillor said he would love the HSE to name the tardy hospital doctors and let people know who are the biggest offenders. It was now 2014, he said, and he had been assured that he would get a current updated list.
He was told that the total amount outstanding to UHG was €16.9 million. Cllr Conneely said this was “horrendous”. He outlined that co-operation was not “coming freely” from consultants who were the “highest paid in the system”.
In a written reply to the chairperson’s query, Bill Maher, the chief executive of the West North West Hospital Group, stated that all claims up to December 31 2012 have been signed off by consultants. These have been submitted to the insurance companies. He added that the hospital is dealing with all 2013 claims at present.
