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NHSO and health ministry clash now hits registrar service
CHULARAT SAENGPASSA
THE NATION

Agency says it will take over job as state body decides to drop it

BANGKOK: -- THE NATIONAL Health Security Office (NHSO) has shrugged off the Public Health Ministry's decision to stop providing registrar services for the universal healthcare scheme from April 30. "We are ready to take over the task," the NHSO deputy secretary-general, Dr Peerapol Sutiwisesak, said yesterday.

The ministry's move is seen as an effort to heap additional pressure on the NHSO, which has clashed with the ministry and the Thailand Regional and General Hospital Society (Thaihos) over management of the scheme's fund.

Today, the scheme covers 48 million Thais through the fund managed by the NHSO and services provided by state hospitals.

Thaihos president Dr Sutas Sriwilai, also director of Chiangrai Pracha-nukroh Hospital, said the NHSO should handle registrar services itself because it had always treated the Public Health Ministry as just the provider of

medical services for the scheme.

According to the NHSO, people will need registrar services from the universal healthcare scheme for births, change in employment status etc. "For example, new graduates may get jobs and become insured members of the social security fund. When they join the social-security scheme, they have to leave the universal healthcare scheme," Peerapol said.

He said the NHSO updated the database of the universal healthcare scheme's members twice a month.

"There have been six-digit changes each month," he said.

However, Peerapol expressed confidence that the NHSO would be able to handle the tasks and service users would not be affected by the ministry's move.

"We will be expanding the number of registrar-service units too," he said, "There will be more units available when the registrar tasks move to our hands."

The coordinator of People's Health Systems Movement, Sureerat Treemanka, said the Public Health Ministry should not hold people hostage over the universal healthcare scheme even when it clashed with the NHSO.

"If problems arise, it's best to focus on how to find solutions without affecting the people," she said.

Meanwhile, the NHSO is now holding a public forum to gather opinion from service providers and healthcare networks on how to solve problems related to the universal healthcare scheme.

Suraporn Loiha, who heads the Provincial Public Health Chiefs Society, told the forum that the fund for the scheme should be allocated via the Public Health Ministry's healthcare service area offices so that the resources could be shared.

"The per-head subsidy is not practical," he said. Suraporn's idea is in line with the proposal being put forward by the ministry and Thaihos. The two-day forum will conclude today.

Source: http://www.nationmultimedia.com/national/NHSO-and-health-ministry-clash-now-hits-registrar--30252944.html


-- The Nation 2015-01-30