The Acting Regional Director of the Koforidua Hospital, Dr. Cardinal Kofi Newton says though the hospital has witnessed an increase in National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) coverage, the facility is still incurring cost because some patients abscond without settling their medical bills not covered by the scheme.
The hospital recorded 52% of absconders in 2017 and 63% in 2019 and was able to retrieve GHC120,854.00.
Speaking in an interview with GBC’s Sunrise FM in Koforidua, Dr. Newton said the hospital still has to recover GHC140,489.00 lost through this canker.
The hospital is, therefore, appealing to the Department of Social Welfare to help enable them to retrieve the rest of the money for effective services.
He noted that 266,296 clients visited the Out-Patient Department (OPD) in 2019 and out of this number, 221,426 had health insurance while 40,766 had no insurance.
This, he said, is a positive sign that the NHIS is improving the health needs of Ghanaians.
