PUNE: Auditors have not come across a single case of overcharging for Covid treatment by private hospitals in the last couple of weeks amid Indian Medical Association’s (IMA) demand to set parameters for the audit of such bills.
“We are carrying out the audit but have not found any objectionable case for the last couple of weeks,” said Manisha Naik, assistant medical officer of Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC).
She said the auditors were duly visiting the hospitals and doing their duty of checking the bills above Rs 1 lakh.
PMC data shows that 1,400 complaints have been crossverified since August 2020.
Bill amounts were reduced in 1,050 cases and around Rs 4.6 crore have been returned to the patients concerned.
According to IMA officebearers, the tool of audit was being misused in many cases.
Some patients were presenting old bills for scrutiny, some of them even raised objections after getting reimbursement under the medical insurance.
They wanted to use the audits with malafide intention, the office-bearers alleged.
“Therefore, we have demanded a deadline for submitting objections against the bills.
A time-limit of 8-10 days should be set for submitting the bills for audit once the patient is discharged.
The complaints coming after the time period should not be entertained.
The tool of audit must not be misused,” said Balasaheb Deskhmukh, president of IMA.
Deskhmukh said if the patient had taken money from insurance company for treatments, s/he should not be allowed to claim benefit of the reimbursement from the audit.
PMC officials said the action taken against errant hospitals included cancellation of their licence.
The civic body had issued notices before taking any action.
In some cases, permission given to the hospitals to treat Covid-19 patients was withdrawn.
Overcharging was done in treatment in intensive care units and charges of personal protection equipment (PPE) kits.
Objections were also raised against heavy administration charges, the officials said.