Managed Care or Network Care, however it is marketed to be more palatable to the Australian Public is basically the Americanisation of the Australian Healthcare System. Where Healthcare is driven by organisations in the interest of shareholders and investors rather than members.
Under the chaos of the current pandemic changes are being introduced quietly but we should not underestimate the long-term negative impact this will have on the quality and access to healthcare.
At the core of Us style Managed Care to date are “Prior authorisations”—sometimes called precertification or prior approval—this is a health plan cost-control process by which Doctors and other health care providers must obtain advance approval from a health plan before a specific service is delivered to the patient to qualify for payment coverage.
Though those with vested interest & in cahoots with the Insurance companies may misinform the public otherwise, prior authorisations, network hospitals and excessive co-payments are still part and parcel of the current US managed healthcare system. Although currently may not be permitted in Australia, ACCC approval of Honeysuckle NIB Cigna buying group is certainly a huge leap towards the introduction of “Managed Care” into Australia.
Why wait to have managed care to be completely introduced and integrated in Australia? The US find it hard to wind back from this type of System because of the sheer volume of money Insurance companies have in “influencing” decision & policy makers – once Pandora’s box is open we may never be able to close it…
Health care is continuously changing and we should be changing for the better & protect patient-centric care. Australian Private health insurance companies’ self interest in protecting their bottom line is blatantly obvious. It is fairly short-sighted to allow the process towards US managed care to even begin and naive to believe it will not morph our Australian Healthcare System into full blown US style managed style care.
Write to your Local Federal MP here and Support Anti-Managed Care Legislation #sendtheeaglehome #noUSmanagedhealthcare #supportantimanagedcarelegislation #regulate #legislate #mitigate