FEES CHARGED BY ANAESTHESIOLOGISTS INCLUDE THE FOLLOWING:
Pre-Operative Consultation
The anaesthesiologist will visit you before the operation to assess any patient risk factors and to plan your anaesthetic management. This may take place in the ward or the surgical waiting area depending on your procedure, time of admission etc.
Time-based anaesthetic procedure fee
Depending on the duration of your procedure / operation, a time-based anaesthetic fee will be charged.
Procedure fee
A fee calculated according to the anaesthetic difficulty of the indicated surgical procedure.
Emergency fee
An additional “emergency fee” may be charged if your procedure is either unbooked prior to the start of the list or an emergency, irrespective of the time of the day.
Other additional fees
- Emergency travel fee : If the attending anaesthesiologist needs to make a special trip to the venue where your procedure take place.
- Epidurals and nerve blocks for pain relief.
- Arterial and central venous lines for monitoring of your condition during the anaesthetic.
- Patients in the prone position during the procedure.
- Babies less than a month old
- Patients older than 70 years of age.
- Orthopaedic modifiers depending on where the operation is.
Important
Previously the Health Professions Council of South Africa (HPCSA) a statuary body, determined the guidelines for reasonable professional fees, and the Council for medical Schemes the “Reference Price List”, effectively the lowest tariff medical funders would pay.
The Competition board and Courts have stopped all setting of prices and at this stage each medical aid and doctor set their own prices.
The rates that medical aids will pay depends on the individual funder and the plans they offer. This may vary between an inflation adjusted RPL rate and 400% of this rate.
To enable us to provide the quality service our patients deserve, Brink Anesthesiologist have linked our fees to the cost of delivering the service and benchmarked this to other professional services. This rate is covered by the top plans of many medical aids and we have a direct payment arrangement with Fedhealth as well as Discovery Medical Aid for their Classic and Executive plans with no co-payments on these plans.
You are therefore advised to check what benefits your medical aid will pay. Please feel free to discuss tariff queries with the anaesthesiologist, as you remain personally responsible for the account.
The Brink Anaesthesiology Firm may offer a discount for early payment. Please check your account – statement for discount details.
All private patients should contact the Brink Firm for a quotation and settle the account before or on the day of surgery.
