Delays In The Payment Of NHIS Claims Over - Dr Kunbuor

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Created on Saturday, 06 November 2010 00:00

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Health Minister Dr Benjamin Kunbuor said delays in the payment of the National Health Insurance claims had been halted and arrears between 2007 and 2009 paid.

He said what was left to be paid was only a tiny percentage. Dr Kunbuor was responding to parliamentary questions on the floor of parliament in Accra on Wednesday.He said a modern claims processing centre had been established which was currently handling claims from the teaching hospitals and the regional hospitals in the country.

At full capacity, the Minister said, the centre was capable of processing 15,000 claims per day, but that currently the centre was processing 10,000 claims per day. "Monitoring of the activities of the District Mutual Insurance Schemes and vetting of claims have been sealed up as important cost control interventions," he said.

He noted that an electronic monitoring of prescribing patterns was also being developed.On Government’s plans to provide Community Health Improvement Project (CHIP) facilities to Nkwaakwaa and Serentiatia communities, Dr Kunbuor said at Serentiatia the District Health Directorate through the District Assembly had submitted a proposal to the Japanese Grant for Grassroots Human Security Project for assistance to construct a CHIP compound.

He said the ministry would staff and equip the project as soon as it was completed. Responding to a question on when Weija Municipality would have a government hospital, Dr Kumbuor said Government was in negotiation for a concessionary loan from an external source to construct 12 hospitals.

He added that a 100 bed Municipal Hospital would be put up at Weija through this facility. On providing accommodation for Dadieso Health Centre, he explained that Dadieso Health Centre was one out of a total of 23 newly completed health centres all over the country under the Rural Health Services Project II, with funding from OPC.

The Health Minister added that the project was planned for District Assemblies to provide accommodation, and that with available funding the Ministry of Health (MOH) could provide many more health centres. "Unfortunately, District Assemblies in most of the beneficiary sites have reneged from this co-financing arrangement," he said.

He stated that the MOH had therefore decided to capture the 23 health centres as part of the uncompleted projects of the ministry for which a concessionary loan was being secured for completion.

Source: GNA