Queen Mary Private - Just Money Minded?

K

kavijh

Registered User
Hello Everyone,

Just wanted to share an experience that makes me question QM Private as a good option in the Public Vs Private debate:

Since we are expecting Twins, and the best NICU is at Queen Mary... We wanted to consider the private section of the Hospital.

We were pretty Surprised to find out the following while booking:

1) At Queen Mary Private, you can only use one of the Obgyn's that operate there. This is unlike all of the other Private Hospitals in Hong Kong (e.g. Matilda and Sanitorium)

2) They access information the Public Hostpital to prevent you from using any public services there! Basically they called to tell me: 'We know you have an appointment to try Register in the Public Hospital This week (Which we had not told them). We have to Cancel the Appointment with the public hospital if you still want to see us at the Queen Mary private hospital next week.'
I Asked them, 'If we haven't come to see the doctor yet, how can we decide if Public or Private is best for us?' .... Their reply: 'It's our Hospital policy'

- I Guess you could get around this by Seeing the QM Private Hospital doctor first, and doing the registration at the public after (only if you decide not to go ahead with the QM Private. )

3) They Publish no official Price List. (You have to individually request the price for Each Service.)

4) When I asked about our babies access to public NICU Facilities. They Said: No babies cannot the public NICU. If you deliver at QM Private the Charge for NICU is HK$14,000 per night..... from what we hear (Perhaps someone can confirm this?) even Matilda would send your babies to the QM Public NICU if required. . I mean cant children born in HK access the public NICU in their own right?

The last point really helped us make up our mind: 'No thank you, please cancel our Appointment at QM Private.

Just thought this could be helpful to some of you considering QM Private.

Cheers!
Kavi
 
yes, that sounds about right.... but i'm not sure why you are surprised? if they didn't clearly delineate what was private and what was public, people would waffle back and forth.

i never thought it was surprising or unusual for these policies.
 
hello carang,

actually what surprises me is that i thought qm private should be run like any other private hospital... but its not.

e.g. matilda / sanitoriun would not prevent you from going to register at Tsan Yuk hospital. infact they wouod not even have access to that info.

e.g. 2 if after delivery your babies need access to a public (govt cost covered) level 3 nicu .... in sanitoriun or matilda you hqve the option of sending them there. at qm public.... but in qm private you must go through them.

im also surprised that they dont publish a price list like most other hospitals do....
 
the difference is that there are two parts of the same hospital. they need to keep them straight.

if you aren't happy with the way they do things, then there are lots of choices out there for you.
 
and if you don't want to pay all of their fees, then just go public all the way... lots of us have done it and lived to tell the tale.:yeah2:
 
It's an administrative nightmare if patients move back and forth from private to public care.
 
I Totally agree that moving patients private and public care would difficult for the hospital......

...but its still important to note that a regular private hospital will give you access to the medically superior public system should it be required in an unpredictable emergency (e.g. Congenital Problems, Premature Delivery, etc).

QM Private, on the other hand will not.... It could well be because it complicated to manage (Even though the other private hospitals manage to do it)... However It could also be financially motivated considering the demand for HK's top hospitals... coming from across the border.

Irrespective of the reason, It is a drawback when compared to other private hospitals OR the public system.

Apologies for the title btw. looking back at it now it seems harsh and should read: 'A Little Money Minded?...'

Caran G.... I have nothing against the full public system.... We will very likely take that route.... Just sharing the research.....
 
I actually was surprised to find our #4 when I enquired about it earlier this year. We were planning a pregnancy knowing that there was a chance our child would have a genetic condition and hence need NICU - and were trying to decide whether or not to get insurance or not. Personally I wanted to go QMH private and have the baby in NICU as a public patient. Our last daughter who had the same condition was in for 4 months. They told me that if I was a private patient for the delivery, I also needed to pay full cost for the baby's NICU stay which could have run into the millions and would not have been covered by the insurance - so we decided not to even bother getting the medical insurance and just sucking up the annoyances associated with being a public patient. I don't think that this point is obvious without asking them specifically.
 
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