Health is a very lucrative field in Malaysia. Today there are over two hundred private hospitals in the country. And possibly more will be established in the coming years. Private clinics have existed a long time ago, and are now very common establishments. But only in the last few decades have private hospitals become more prominent.
Only the rich will be able to use these medical facilities. Compared to charges for treatments acquired from government hospitals, treatment costs at private hospitals are much steeper.
Let me quote a few cases that have been highlighted in the media. A retiree said that the family had to fork out almost RM60,000 for medical expenses for their 87-year-old mother who had been hospitalised at a private institution. She had been warded at the CCU for one week and then transferred to a single bedroom for 35 days. No surgery was performed. And yet the bill came to a whopping RM59,000.
The bill also covered the fees for a nutritionist, which cost RM85 per visit. According to the retiree, the specialists would come in twice a day and all they did was ask how the patient was feeling, and this lasted less than five minutes. Charges were incurred for each visit. Charges were also levied for the services of the nurse after 9.30pm.
In another case, a kindergarten teacher said that the medical expenses for her father, who was treated for brain tumour at a public hospital, only came to RM800. Before seeking medical aid from the public hospital, friends had recommended a neurologist at a private hospital to her. At that private meeting, the specialist, after quickly flipping through her father’s medical records, told her it would cost RM40,000 to treat her father.
These are two of the many stories told to the press. Regretfully, I too have had some very bad experiences. Some years back, I suffered from acute bronchitis and was taken to a private hospital. The specialist who was assigned to attend to me was not an expert on bronchial matters. But the treatment proceeded with the same doctor.
What I could not understand was why this specialist retained me, instead of transferring me to a proper specialist. It already cost me a substantial amount of money, and yet there was no respite in my condition.
Health is a very lucrative field in Malaysia. Today there are over two hundred private hospitals in the country. And possibly more will be established in the coming years.
Private clinics have existed a long time ago, and are now very common establishments. But only in the last few decades have private hospitals become more prominent.
Only the rich will be able to use these medical facilities. Compared to charges for treatments acquired from government hospitals, treatment costs at private hospitals are much steeper.
Let me quote a few cases that have been highlighted in the media.
A retiree said that the family had to fork out almost RM60,000 for medical expenses for their 87-year-old mother who had been hospitalised at a private institution.
She had been warded at the CCU for one week and then transferred to a single bedroom for 35 days. No surgery was performed.
And yet the bill came to a whopping RM59,000. The bill also covered the fees for a nutritionist, which cost RM85 per visit.
According to the retiree, the specialists would come in twice a day and all they did was ask how the patient was feeling, and this lasted less than five minutes. Charges were incurred for each visit.
Charges were also levied for the services of the nurse after 9.30pm.
In another case, a kindergarten teacher said that the medical expenses for her father, who was treated for brain tumour at a public hospital, only came to RM800.
Before seeking medical aid from the public hospital, friends had recommended a neurologist at a private hospital to her. At that private meeting, the specialist, after quickly flipping through her father’s medical records, told her it would cost RM40,000 to treat her father.
These are two of the many stories told to the press.
Regretfully, I too have had some very bad experiences.
Some years back, I suffered from acute bronchitis and was taken to a private hospital. The specialist who was assigned to attend to me was not an expert on bronchial matters. But the treatment proceeded with the same doctor.
What I could not understand was why this specialist retained me, instead of transferring me to a proper specialist. It already cost me a substantial amount of money, and yet there was no respite in my condition.
Every time I suffered an attack, someone had to rush me to the hospital for the use of the nebuliser as I could not breathe. That again cost money.
After the failure of the treatment at this private hospital, I was then admitted to the UKM Medical Centre.
I was warded at this hospital for about three weeks with a proper specialist attending to me, and proper care was also given.
Medical students would come over to find the cause of the illness. The specialist, who was also one of the teaching staff, would explain to them what the illness was and how the recovery was taking place.
There was no special room and all the patients were placed in one big room, with curtains separating each patient from the other.
All in all, it only cost me less than RM200. I was given proper medicine and attention.
I recovered from acute bronchitis and up to now, I have not had any attack.
And about three years back, I suffered from frequent night time urination, which disturbed my sleep.
My company sent me to another private hospital.
The specialist who took my case immediately informed me that I needed a prostate operation. I had asked whether he would prescribe some oral medicines for the case. But he insisted that the only solution was through this operation.
I therefore underwent the operation, which cost the company a very substantial amount of money.
After having undergone the operation, the problem still went on. My night time urination persisted. More operations were done on the prostate, but it did not alleviate what I was suffering from.
Instead of looking into the cause of my problem, the specialist took me to see another specialist, who was also an expert on the same problem. He showed the video of my operation to this specialist, and this other specialist informed me that my operation had been done correctly.
But my problem was not the operation’s accuracy, but to get rid of my nighttime urination problem. They, however, did not touch on that subject at all.
And the matter was left just like that.
And I still suffered from this illness.
Recently, I went to the Universiti Malaya Medical Centre for treatment. So far it has cost me only a small sum, and the attention given by the various doctors is commendable.
I will have my bladder operated on in a couple of weeks’ time, and hopefully my nighttime urination problem will be cured.
It seems that wealth, rather than health, is the priority at private medical and health institutions.
Article by Encik Ahmad Mustapha Hassan is a former press secretary to second Prime Minister Abdul Razak Hussein
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