ANAESTHESIOLOGIST FEES
Account
You will receive a completely separate account from the anaesthesiologist. There will also be other
accounts from the surgeon, radiologists, physiotherapist, pharmacist and hospital.
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
- 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.
- Epidurals, nerve blocks, postoperative drug infusions and ‘patient controlled analgesia’ (PCA) devices for pain relief.
- Arterial and central venous lines for careful monitoring of your condition during and after the procedure.
- Should you need specific or goal directed blood pressure control during your procedure.
- The performance of ultrasound guided procedures.
- Patients in non-typical positions during the procedure.
- Patients less than a year old, or older than 70 years of age.
- Body mass index (BMI) if greater than or equal to 35kg/m2.
- Orthopaedic modifiers depending on the site of surgery.
- Operations on the head/neck.
- Insertion of a nasogastric tube.
- Should the patient have systemic illnesses causing functional impairment.
- Should the patient be ventilated or admitted to intensive care.
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, Dr Sehlapelo has linked her fees to the cost of delivering the service and benchmarked this to other professional services. This rate is 300% Discovery Executive is covered by the top plans of many medical aids and I have a direct payment arrangement with Discovery Medical Aid and Bonitas with no co-payments on these plans.
Your medical aid pays you out at the rate they unilaterally determine according to the plan you take with them which may be vastly different to the rate determined by the anaesthesiologist.
Be aware that your medical aid/funder may call this “the 100% rate” but this refers ONLY to their rates. Additionally, every anaesthetic account has to include VAT as the government has legislated that healthcare is a value added item and they have added 15% to each account.
You are therefore advised to check what benefits your medical aid will pay. Please feel free to discuss tariff queries with the Dr Sehlapelo, as you remain personally responsible for the account. All private patients should contact Dr Sehlapelo or Pellucid Zone Billing for a quotation and settle the account before or on the day of surgery.