Reduced cover by Voluntary Health Insurance is putting patients with lung disease at risk, according to the Irish Hospital Consultants Association. Over 100,000 VHI subscribers a year suffer from respiratory illnesses, mostly during the winter.
The consultants' body says that since the VHI increased its premiums in April, without informing subscribers that respiratory ailments no longer attract full cover, those members with lung cancer, asthma, bronchitis and other chest ailments are balance-billed for tests and treatments.
But VHI, in a statement yesterday, rejected the claims and assured members that they are fully covered with the 95 per cent of all consultants who have signed agreements with the health insurance company.
It said that VHI is currently in negotiations with 12 respiratory physicians who resigned from the full participation scheme last June.
"The rates that VHI pay for the wide range of medical procedures it covers are in line with objective international standards," said the statement.
However Mr Finbarr Fitzpatrick, secretary general of the IHCA, said that negotiations are not ongoing at present and previous negotiations "were going nowhere".
"This debate is about a decrease in the payment of fees rather than an increase for respiratory physicians," he said.
Prof Gerry McElvaney, consultant respiratory physician at Beaumont Hospital, said yesterday that consultants carry out around 4,000 complex lung test procedures on private patients every year. He said this was far less than the average in other EU states and North America.
"These tests enable early diagnosis and treatment of lung disease in patients before irreparable damage is caused.
"The VHI's decision to drastically reduce coverage is putting lunge disease patients at severe risk and will, in the long term, increase the probability of serious illness and hospitalisation for treatment of patients who might otherwise have benefited from early diagnosis."
According to the consultants' association, the respiratory physicians withdrew from the VHI full cover scheme "following VHI's decision to reduce coverage benefits for certain lung diseases and its attempt to introduce protocols to reduce lung testing for particular ailments."
The VHI statement said cost containment is a key issue and "we will continue to negotiate vigorously on behalf of our members to keep health care affordable."