A new website allows specialist doctors to provide patients with a confidential online quote on the cost and wait time for care.
The site is being hailed by its founder as a solution to the twin problems of lack of transparency in medical costs, and giving doctors with empty diaries the chance to drum up business.
But critics claim the site could trigger a “race to the bottom” as patients abandon their GP’s professional judgement in favour of cheaper rates.
Private Patient Connect currently allows patients to obtain quotes from around 300 surgeons in western Sydney, and will soon open up to include physicians working anywhere in Sydney.
The secure platform, developed with support from a NSW Government $25,000 grant, allows patients with an open referral to request quotes from doctors, by outlining their medical needs and uploading any relevant documentation such as x-rays. Doctors can respond with an online quote outlining fees, availability and location of service.
It offers a secure interaction between a doctor and patient and is free for patients, while surgeons pay a 4.9% referral fee for all consultations and operations, while the physicians’ fee is not yet finalised, said the company’s founder and CEO, Tess van der Rijt.
The platform is designed to protect patient confidentiality: staff review patient requests to ensure necessary documentation such GP referral is present, then de-identify the data before sending it on to specialists with the right sub-specialisation and location, who are signed up to the site. It also meets the strict rules around advertising of medical services set by the National Law, she said.
Ms van der Rijt said her website will increase choice for patients by providing them with information on wait times and costs, avoiding the potential to have to return to a GP who has referred them to an unsuitable specialist, noting that transparency of medical costs has become a hot-button issue and the subject of a new Senate inquiry.
It will also help specialists who are struggling to fill appointments, something she said is a problem not only for new fellows who have yet to build a referral base, but also experienced consultants in areas of oversupply, a phenomenon that stems from a “market failure” in Australia’s system for specialist referrals, claimed Ms van der Rijt who has worked in health system policy and reform for ten years, the past four as a consultant advising State and Federal health departments, health service providers and digital health agencies.
“Specialist doctors spend decades studying only to find that they become a consultant and have to run their own business, this is something they are not trained in or exposed to,” she tells the limbic.
“To attract new patients they need to advertise themselves to GPs and then passively wait for GP referrals. There is a market failure where a GP has their three preferred cardiologists, and constantly refers to them. A new GP joins the practice, doesn’t have a referral network, asks their colleague and they start referring to the same cardiologist. But there are other cardiologists who are available but they just don’t have their referral networks with their GP. ”