Hospitals ‘strictly prohibited’ from charging for donated PPE use By Ma. Teresa Montemayor
Healthcare facilities are strictly prohibited from charging patients for the use of donated personal protective equipment (PPE), a health official said Monday. In a virtual media forum, Department of Health (DOH) Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire clarified that aside from the donated PPE, pieces of hospitalacquired PPE may be charged to patients during the Covid-19 health emergency response period as per Department Memorandum 20200269.
department memorandum and the allowable amount to recover administrative costs on PPE is to be 30 percent of the total cost,” she added.
Vergeire noted that there are three variables considered in the costing of PPE -- patient’s room accommodation, PPE for the patient and the visitors, and the number of “We need to consider these the patient’s healthcare worker per PPEs, talagang pinagkakagastusan shift. ito (facilities spend on them), especially from the private sector,” “First room accommodation, if Vergeire. it’s ward, separate isolation room, However, patients can not or intensive care units because we be charged for the use of PPE that know different rooms in the hospital have been donated to healthcare have different PPE use. For example facilities -- both public and private. in ICU, direct care to the patient “It is strictly prohibited to charge on who is severe and critical, you have PPEs donated to them, so we have higher (more) use of PPE unlike when that inventory of donated PPEs in a patient is in a ward,” she said. these facilities,” Vergeire said. To keep healthcare facilities “This Department Memorandum from overcharging patients on the says (that) all health facilities must use of PPE, Vergeire said the DOH has follow the cost and rate-setting asked its regional offices to monitor guidelines provided for in this PPE costs nationwide. (PNA)
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| Sept. 26 - Oct. 02, 2020
