Hospital seeking NAf. 11M
for 2008 budget agreement
~ Will consider measures if no agreement reached ~
CAY HILL--There is a two-million-guilder difference between the amounts the Social Insurance Bank SVB and St. Maarten Medical Center (SMMC) are tabling for a new budget agreement to cover the medical treatment of SVB clients at the hospital next year.
While the hospital is asking for 11 million guilders, SVB has proposed 8,975,000.
SMMC General Director Dr. George Scot said the hospital’s proposal was based on its audited financial statement for 2006 and the projected cost to treat SVB clients next year. He said the hospital’s proposal excluded cost-of-living adjustments, additional money the hospital has to find annually to cover cost-of-living adjustment payments to its employees.
The hospital’s audited financial statement for 2006 shows that the cost of treating SVB clients last year amounted to NAf. 8,845,000, some NAf. 745,000 less than the amount stipulated in the budget agreement then-minister of health Sandra Smith had put in place for that year.
Scot said too that AOV premiums would be increased next year, which would be an additional NAf. 200,000 cost for the hospital. “This alone is more than the additional amount SVB is proposing and it’s the same SVB that will collect these premiums.”
Scot said the hospital was hoping to receive a reaction from Health Minister Omayra Leeflang on the deadlock between the two sides by this Friday, or it might be forced to resort to other measures.
“We will wait until Friday for a reply from the Minister and if we don’t get a reply, then we will have to assume that by January 1 there will be no budget agreement,” Scot said. “We will then have two options: we will either have to bill SVB per treatment based on the 2001 tariffs or cancel our working relationship with SVB and not accept SVB cards anymore. The hospital can’t accept a guarantee card that is not a guarantee for payment.”
Meanwhile, Health Commissioner Maria Buncamper-Molanus said on Tuesday that the Executive Council would be sending a letter to Leeflang asking her to intervene in the SMMC/SVB impasse.
“Little or no progress is being made between the two negotiating parties. The Executive Council wants to avoid any unfortunate action being taken by SMMC and will request the Minister’s urgent intervention,” Buncamper-Molanus stated in a press release.
Leeflang had asked the two parties to iron out an agreement by November 1 or she would step in and set an amount, in the same manner that Smith had done during her tenure.
While the two parties have agreed on the method of calculation for the new budget agreement, they are not in agreement on the percentage of the hospital cost that SVB should cover.
Scot said the cost-price analysis for the medical centre showed that its efficiency had increased over the years. He said the average cost per procedure at SMMC, for example, was going down annually.
