Clare Daly (Dublin Fingal, Independent)
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1576. To ask the Minister for Health if his attention has been drawn to the practice of hospital administration pressurising private insured patients into foregoing treatment as public patients as recently reported by the media (details supplied); and if he will make a statement on the matter. [29018/17]

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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Although a proportion of activity in public hospitals involves the provision of care to private patients, the core purpose of the system is to provide services for public patients. Government policy is to ensure there is equitable access for public patients, that the proportion of private activity is appropriately controlled and that the costs of provision of services to private patients are recouped by public hospitals.

The Health Act 1970 (as amended) provides that all persons ordinarily resident in the country are, subject to certain charges, eligible for public in-patient hospital services. However, persons can opt to be treated privately on admission to a public hospital, in which case they are liable for the consultants fees and hospital charges arising for that episode of care, whether paid for by the patient or by a health insurer on their behalf. Where private in-patient services are provided the daily charges that apply depend on the category of hospital and whether the overnight accommodation was in a single or multi-occupancy room.

Hospital admission staff are required to speak with patients to establish whether they wish to be treated as a private patient and to sign the required forms. I would expect that no undue pressure would be placed on patients to be treated privately and I have previously stated that the operational procedures by the HSE to manage this process should take account of the health status of patients in hospitals. The HSE has indicated that it is always intended that admissions staff will only engage in a conversation with patients regarding their public or private status when appropriate and would consult with clinical staff involved in the treatment of a patient before engaging on this issue. I have asked my Department to ensure that common protocols are used to establish the wishes of patients in this regard.

It is worth noting that the Department has recently conducted an analysis of trends in private activity in public hospitals since the Health (Amendment) Act 2013 commenced. The key conclusion from the analysis is that the proportion of patients treated privately in public hospitals remained very stable over recent years and did not increase significantly following the introduction of the new charging regime in 2014.