Doug Ford government paying for-profit clinic more than hospitals for OHIP-covered surgeries, documents show
Doug Ford government paying for-profit clinic more than hospitals for OHIP-covered surgeries, documents show
The documents show provincial agency Ontario Health contracted Don Mills Surgical Unit Ltd. at the following per-surgery funding rates in each of the three fiscal years starting from 2020-21:
• $1,264 for each procedure classed as minor complexity (such as cataract surgery)
• $4,037 for each moderate complexity surgery (such as a laparoscopic gallbladder removal)
• $5,408 for each higher-complexity surgery (such as repairing a large tear of a rotator cuff).
The funding rates do not include how much the surgeon bills OHIP for each operation. The physician's billing for a particular OHIP-covered surgery is identical whether it takes place in a hospital or a private clinic. ---
"We pay more because its gooder and the gooder it is the more we pay. But its cheaper so that's why it's better and we should switch to private healthcare." -Doug Ford
This is the best summary I could come up with:
That discrepancy raises questions about the government's imminent plans to expand the volume and scope of surgeries performed outside of hospitals, including the potentially lucrative field of hip and knee replacements.
The documents show provincial agency Ontario Health contracted Don Mills Surgical Unit Ltd. at the following per-surgery funding rates in each of the three fiscal years starting from 2020-21:
A spokesperson for Health Minister Sylvia Jones says the province contracted DMSU as part of its efforts to catch up on backlogs of publicly funded surgeries stemming from the COVID-19 pandemic.
Clearpoint is wholly owned by the $1.5 billion private equity firm Kensington Capital Partners Ltd., which launched the chain through a $35 million purchase of clinics in Ontario, Manitoba, Alberta and B.C.
The higher per-surgery funding to Clearpoint's clinic debunks the government's claims about the benefits of outsourcing OHIP-covered procedures, says Andrew Longhurst, a health policy researcher at Simon Fraser University.
"Having this [funding] information tells us that the main rationale that the government has used to argue for greater for-profit delivery simply doesn't pass the sniff test," said Longhurst in an interview.
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