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PhilHealth Launches Quality Awards for Partner-Providers - March 2007
IN line with its commitment to ensure quality health care services for all members of the National Health Insurance Program (NHIP), the Philippine Health Insurance Corporation (PhilHealth) will soon recognize qualified accredited health care institutions proven to be safe, efficient and a haven of quality output and services beneficial to both members and their dependents.
In a press briefing today at the Annabel's Restaurant in Quezon City, Dr. Madeleine R. Valera, Vice President for Quality Assurance Research and Policy Development Group and OIC, Office of the Vice President for Health Finance Policy and Services Sector said that PhilHealth has started developing new standards of good health focusing on the quality of services being provided to members. "PhilHealth shall soon recognize its partner-accredited hospitals that continuously follow the best practices on clinical and quality assurance guidelines," Valera stressed.
She added that giving recognition awards as an incentive to accredited health care providers will encourage these hospitals to aim for excellence in terms of the services that they provide and further promote medical tourism in our country. She added that PhilHealth will identify the kind of recognition to be given to hospitals after the first year of implementation of the PhilHealth Benchbook.
"We will closely monitor the patient's safety and well-being thereby ensuring safe practice and environment in the hospital. The deserving hospital will be named Center of Safety," Valera said. The next step for the hospital is to meet the standards where information and human resource management, as well as leadership and management are achieved.
"Once the hospital passes these standards, recognition as a Center of Quality shall be granted," she stressed, adding that once a certain hospital has consistently pursued these standards and moves towards optimum results of their quality assurance programs, PhilHealth will bestow on them the recognition as a Center of Excellence.
During the first year of implementation of the PhilHealth Benchbook, PhilHealth will concentrate on the standards of patient's rights and organizational ethics. This will address how the health care providers respect the rights of its members and how certain policies will address ethical behaviors. Moreover, PhilHealth will also focus on patient's care wherein these hospitals should follow the good standards of treatment for particular illnesses.
Valera reveals that ongoing preliminary assessments in different hospitals is now taking place and that PhilHealth is currently tapping third party surveyors where experts from different medical societies, hospital management organizations, and other stakeholders are invited to determine which among these hospitals deserve such prestigious awards from PhilHealth. "We hope that by the end of the year or early next year, we might already identify the names of these hospitals to be awarded," Valera discloses.
She also pointed out that this will encourage the hospitals and their staffmembers to be serious with the new set of standards developed by PhilHealth based on the structural standards set by the Department of Health (DOH). "We are also looking into the possibility of extending the hospital's accreditation for two (2) years once any of these recognitions is achieved," she further stressed.
PhilHealth continues to find ways by which our members and their dependents are assured of only the highest quality medical care services. "We are committed to ensure that our members are able to avail themselves of timely and quality medical care from our health care providers, so it is high time that we get to recognize the efforts of our partner-accredited hospitals in bringing out the best quality health care they provide," Valera said.