Full paying patients but given slow and poor service

Feb 23, 2007
FRIDAY MATTERS
When private patients' patience can wear thin
By Chua Mui Hoong, DEPUTY POLITICAL EDITOR

It led me to wonder: Why would Singaporeans persist in paying private rates in a public hospital, if they have to put up with much longer waiting times, which increase anxiety, waste time sitting in a hospital waiting room when they could be resting at home if ill, or working if well, and generally endure a poorer quality of customer service?

It isn't as though rates for private patients in public hospitals are that much lower than rates in the private sector. (Data on the Ministry of Health website comparing rates for some procedures suggests that cost can be 20 to 30per cent less in public hospitals for Class A patients than at private hospitals.)

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A simple explanation may be that the Singapore health care system is overloaded and overworked? Or can it be that Singaporeans are working themselves to such an unhealthy state?

Why has the health care system in Singapore has such long waiting times?
Why are the public hospitals inefficient compared to the private ones?

Why not have an insurance policy that pays for private hospitalisation?
Why not choose faster and better health care?

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