To want to hear your views and experiences of private healthcare

[PaddleBoardingMomma]

Posting for traffic.

Having read a couple of posts this week where the OP was seriously unwell and had an awful time in A & E, also reading past threads of massive referral waiting times, GP's being unhelpful and the struggle to even get seen, it's made me wonder about those of us who have opted for private care and how your experiences have differed?

I must admit, seeing so many struggle and have pretty dire outcomes last year I took out vitality healthcare for me and my two daughters but thankfully haven't needed it yet, so can't comment on what the process is like.

No, its subscription only

Do you mean would those treatments have been covered in a social insurance system? I don't know. The article is comparing the US and UK; it's not looking at what an alternative UK system could be. I just found it interesting because it chimed with my own experience - that I'm paying a lot out of pocket for treatments but unlike friends in other European countries, there's no state-underwritten insurance option.

@Phineyj

No I meant would they be covered by the private insurance we have now because that seemed to be the point of the argument?

That so many Britons are paying for extra treatments they can't get on the nhs they'd be as well just paying for health insurance.

But that only works if the insurance would actually pay for those treatments.

I think people sometimes forget that the insurance companies don't actually want to pay for your treatments. They're in it for the profits.

Not for shelling out hundreds of thousands on a treatment.

We're only hearing the (fairly) simple cases on this thread that don't really cost that much.

What happens in a social insurance system when you need hundreds of thousand worth of emergency ITU care?

Who paid for covid treatments in France?

We all know what happened in Italy. Who paid for that?

Also, you're only out of pocket of you consider your health the states responsibility and not yours

I absolutely don't consider my health the state's responsibility! But it's not OK to pay tax for a system that often seems to aim to prevent you using it, can't be criticised and can't be opted out of.

@Phineyj

Do you know the answer to my question?

Thos whole thread has been full of criticism. You cant opt out of it because pp doesn't provide emergency care and there has to be some limits to a publicly funded service

I don't know how emergency care is provided in other European countries, no. Either of us could find out if we wanted to, couldn't we?

What I do know is that friends living in other European countries seem to be getting a better service overall so I think it would be valuable if we collectively had more of an open mind on this in the UK.

I worked for the NHS for some years so I have seen some of the pros and cons from the inside as well as on the outside as a patient.

@Phineyj last summer I had a bad fall in the foothills of the Pyrenees. DH had to dash on foot for 20-30 minutes to get a signal. The SAMU were with me within 90 minutes - stretchered me down to their vehicle and I was in hospital in Perpignan within about 2.5/3 hours. I was seen by an orthopaedic specialist within about an hour and a half of arriving, admitted (badly fractured wrist and fractured vertebrae). I had a pleasant single room and the wrist was reduced under local. My arm was put in a half cast and I was kept on morphine until my wrist was pinned and plated about 36 hours later. I saw the orthopaedic surgeon and spine specialist before I was discharged on the Tuesday morning. Everyone was kind, helpful and communicated helpfully despite French being very much my 2nd language nobody spoke to me as though I were an idiot. I had one appointment in outpatients at our local hospital and switched to private the staff were so rude.

Compare and contrast to my neighbour's experience about a month later - exactly the same wrist fracture. Fell in our village and waited in the rain for three hours for an ambulance. Got to A&E and waited for 7 hours to see the new F1 who was evidently hopeless and made her cry. Had her wrist reduced under G&A and was sent home at 6am with 10 cocodamol and no information about follow up. She was called two days later and told she needed surgery to pin and plate and an appointment was made to discuss in outpatients two days later. She was told to be on standby for a call for surgery due to Covid and backlogs. She waited six days for the call and had to.go for a covid test that day and back again the next morning. She waited in the day unit until 4.30 and was told they couldn't operate because the day unit shut at 6pm and there were no beds if she needed extra care afterwards. That happened two more times. And it was 12 days after the break that the surgery took.place adding nearly two more weeks to her recovery time.

I understand outpatients were unhelpful and she received no advice about exercises until her 2nd outpatient appointment when she had to insist on a referral to hand therapy that was grudgingly given.

I was given advice about exercises from day one, even before the surgery. When I switched to orivate in the UK I had an appointment with hand therapies within a week and three follow ups.

I have almost full movement back; my neighbour hasn't and her hand/wrist still hurts. I have a barely visible very neat scar; hers is not nearly so neat.

There is no comparison imo. The care I had in France was public care.

The NHS is underfunded, and it has been underfunded for a very long time. I fail to see how handing lots of money to insurance companies would solve this problem.

@Phineyj

Google tells me other European countries are better funded.

They have high taxes for health care and private fees.

We could achieve the same result for the NHS but the tories have made it all but impossible now.

I have BUPA through work and I used it to have my gallbladder removed a few years ago. I was told I could die if it wasn't removed and flared up again so I wasn't going to wait for the NHS! I couldn't fault the care I received privately, unlike the NHS care.

It looks underfunded in the context of gdp but if you add to gdp the costs incurred by the public in relation to NHS interactions the gdp spent on it is humongous. My neighbour lost an additional two weeks of work due to the delays notwithstanding going to the hospital and back by uber for three days running because it's OK to mess the public about.

I honestly don't see how giving it another billion would make its delivery any more efficient when there is a fundamental disconnect in the context of attitude and patient centred service. It runs for the benefit and convenience of its staff rather than it's patients. Notional money changes hands on the Continent, therefore the patient is not treated as though they should be a grateful supplicant at the altar of the NHS, genuflecting to the consultant gods upon entry.

@RosesAndHellebores

Lol.

The nhs is abused and misused by a significant amount of the public who think that because its paid for by their taxes they should get whatever they want as soon as they want

Also, if you dont see how giving it more money would help then we dont need private insurance money

@Topgub well I have never abused it but I have felt abused by it.

I would need to be persuaded money would be used wisely before giving the current system more. It is not fit for purpose. I wholeheartedly support the Continental systems of social insurance which on the whole are delivered to a higher standard.

The last time the NHS was given shed loads of money it tiddled it up the wall on an additional tier of bureaucracy called PCTs. I don't see a stampede looking to implement systems like the NHS anywhere in the world tbh.

@RosesAndHellebores

Oh well. No chance of anything wise happening with the current govt

If you go to a private hospital be aware that they may not have the staff night-time cover by specialist staff or HDU facilities to handle any "out of hours" acute emergency / post-surgery complications. Your very expensive private Consultant is at home, fast asleep; they don't do night shifts .

We recently took out Beneden and have used it for treatment for my dd.

The only thing that has been a good experience is physio. I've been able to claim back our fees for that. Counselling wasn't great, the wait was long and the quality of the therapy wasn't good.

It's now looking like she'll need surgery. We saw the same consultant privately as we did on the NHS a few weeks later. He's said he can't treat her privately as his hospital don't do paediatric surgery so we'd have to go to another hospital 50 miles away to stay private. He said he would prefer to treat her on the NHS anyway as there are more comprehensive paediatric support services he can draw on post surgery. He's advised that as it's not urgent it's probably best to wait and get a more holistic, more local service on the NHS.

We live in a rural area so I don't know how much difference that makes. It feels like we just don't have the choice of private options. I also agree with a pp, there's a piecemeal approach in the private sector, every scan, every appointment, every change in consultant has to be approved and there a back and forth requiring phone calls and letters which takes ages.

I don't think there's one simple answer. I think what's best depends on how good your local provision is - both NHS and private - and what your condition is. The NHS is great for some things but no so much for others. I'll be keeping up the Beneden membership though as it's a reassuring back up to the NHS.

My local.district general hospital.has no consultant A&E cover after 10pm; neither does it have any emergency orthopaedic cover at all. Yet the ambulance service still sends broken bones there.

Do you remember the case of the Asian lady Dr who was struck off and appealed after a child died. The NHS Co sultant that day was at a conference and not present.

While I worked for the NHS the extra £bns were going into 'Agenda for Change'. Which was a small pay rise all round and a lot of regrading posts.

It is just so big that money evaporates.

I've never abused it either...don't know anyone who has either, but I know plenty of people who have left it really late to seek treatment because of not wanting to bother a busy service/the admin/not got 45 mins to spend on hold.

My step needed cataract surgery just before lockdown and it was agreed it would take place. July 2020 he was sent a follow up appointment and advised by the consultant the bar for surgery had been raised from 50% occluded to 70% occluded. My step asked if it could be done privately and was told, yes of course , I can book you in on Friday, £3k. Same consultant, same hospital, same theatre, private wing. I wanted to write to their MP but mother wouldn't have it. They paid because he was losing his confidence in the car. However, they arranged to see a different consultant and booked into a private hospital in the County Town because it stuck in their craw to give £3k x 2 to the same chap who thought it perfectly acceptable to take money when his own service had raised the NHS bar.

My step worked from the age of 15 to 71. Goes to the Dr once a flood. When he needed services the NHS couldn't provide them but he could have purchased the same service from the same people. It stank.

Thank fuck for the NHS then

The NhS is a different cataract op to private.

Private they use a different lens and you rarely need to use your glasses again.

It's to do with you not being an NHS patient. The NHS can't and shouldn't subsidise private treatment, so if you are admitted because of something that happened in a private hospital the NHS should bill you.

If you have insurance then the insurance company should pay the bill.

I was referred under the TWW. Rang a private hospital and was seen the day following my referral, started on a course of treatment and having a follow up before my nhs appt even came through. Privately the consultants give you more time and autonomy in deciding your treatment plan.