SUBIN SUB-METRO MHIS MAKES PROGRESS (PAGE 29)

STORY: George Ernest Asare, Kumasi

Out of an estimated population of 176,307 people in the Subin Constituency in Kumasi, as many as 115,999 have registered with the Subin Sub-metro Mutual Health Insurance Scheme, (MHIS) to afford them the opportunity to access quality health care at an affordable cost.
All the registered members have been issued with Identity Cards, making it possible for them to access healthcare service at the various health centres within the Kumasi metropolis and its environs.
The Scheme Manager, Ms Esther Odoom, told the Daily Graphic in Kumasi that a total of GH¢310,000 was generated as premium from its clients last year with the National Health Council supporting them with GH¢470,000.
She, however, said last year, as much as GH¢1,041,698.98 was paid as claims to the various healthcare centres which provided medical care to the 126,693 clients who accessed medical services in the various healthcare centres in the Kumasi metropolis and its environs.
Ms Odoom said it was the National Health Council that supported the scheme with subsidies that enabled them to honour the claims, stressing that an average of GH¢18.22 was paid as claims for each of the clients who accessed medical care at the health institutions.
She said the Subin MHIS had introduced a system where clients paid a flat rate of GH¢15 as premium with students paying a flat rate of GH¢12 to access quality healthcare delivery.
Ms Odoom said the flat rate was to entice all potential clients to join the scheme to enable them to benefit from quality and affordable health care.
She said national service personnel were made to move from office to office to collect the necessary documents from workers and use them to register.
She said the exercise was working perfectly because it also enabled all potential clients to obtain their identity cards without moving from their offices.
On the challenges that confronted the scheme, Ms Odoom said clients were abusing the system “with their multiple hospital attendance".
She said the multiple hospital attendance rather compounded their problems because the medical officers provided almost the same treatment to the clients which led to drug abuse and increased cost of treatment.