Paying to jump the waiting list

[numtumfutunch]

Interesting one, and Im still not sure where I stand on this

A pal works as a builder and has back pain and sciatica
He is getting lots of gyp from it and its affecting his work and hence income

He's seen a physio and is waiting to see a surgeon
The physio seems to think surgery may be the answer as he isnt getting better

Unfortunately the wait to see a surgeon is 12 weeks!!

Another pal has suggested that £200 would buy an appointment at the private hospital anytime this week and he could then transfer to the NHS for his op
The NHS delay seems to be trying to see the surgeon - when you have the wait for the next step for surgery isnt nearly as long

I had initially thought good on him
£200 is easily justifiable as hes in agony and missing out on work, pay it, see the guy and get his op in 2-3 weeks

But then I began to wonder how fair is this?

If the local NHS offered a service where you could pay to knock 2-3 months off your wait there would be an uproar

Thoughts?

[williaa68]

I don't think it quite works like that - he may jump part of the queue but the NHS will still prioritise by need is my understanding. So if the consultant diagnoses something that needs urgent treatment then maybe but most likely he will want an mri etc and these can get expensive. I am going in for a back op tomorrow which I am paying for - all up with scans etc I don't expect to see much change out of £10k.

[grumbledoak]

There is nothing fair about the NHS; that's just the meaningless, empty rhetoric of the left. For £200 I wouldn't hesitate.

[CharlesdeGaulle]

The NHS isn't about being fair, it's about need. If he needs treatment, and an up-front payment helps, why not?

[numtumfutunch]

CharlesdeGaulle said:

The NHS isn't about being fair, it's about need. If he needs treatment, and an up-front payment helps, why not?

OK so to put it more bluntly:

The wait for back surgery is 12 weeks at your local NHS hospital but if you pay £200 you can jump the queue and 'only' wait 4 weeks

How would that go down???

[Biglips]

williaa68 said:

I don't think it quite works like that - he may jump part of the queue but the NHS will still prioritise by need is my understanding. So if the consultant diagnoses something that needs urgent treatment then maybe but most likely he will want an mri etc and these can get expensive. I am going in for a back op tomorrow which I am paying for - all up with scans etc I don't expect to see much change out of £10k.

This is correct. It can shorten the time considerably to the initial clinical review. After that it makes no difference unless you continue to pay for imaging or other investigations and the op itself. One positive is that it will free up an NHS consultation for someone else.

[zeDuffMan]

numtumfutunch said:

OK so to put it more bluntly:

The wait for back surgery is 12 weeks at your local NHS hospital but if you pay £200 you can jump the queue and 'only' wait 4 weeks

How would that go down???

It would be a lot more than £200 if you wanted it to be done in four weeks! That fee is just to sit in front of a consultant for a bit.

[fatboy b]

In any operation, there'll be two waiting lists. One to get an initial meeting with the consultant, then one to have the op. Both waiting lists will have various things influencing how long they are. Often the consultant will be the same for both NHS & private, so he will "sit" in two places. It's quite normal to pay to jump the first queue, as all you are doing is seeing the guy in his private clinic. Then if you can't afford the op fee or you have no private healthcare, you get put into the NHS queue.

I did this is reverse about 25 years ago. I buggered my knee playing squash. It took 6 weeks to see the consultant on the NHS, then I was piut on an 18 month waiting list. 2 months after the initial visit, I got a new job that had private healthcare. I got re-refered by the GP. < 2 weeks to see the same guy again, and operated on in 4 weeks.

[HughS47]

Private consultation with a spinal surgeon can get expensive if he then needs an MRI etc. If he has had a recent MRI, it makes sense to be seen quicker by going privately, but if the op is on the NHS, he may still have to wait a while. 3-4 weeks is optimistic.

[AlfaPapa]

Except this is not allowed under NHS rules... Although it does happen!


It is acceptable to transfer at any point from a private pathway to an NHS pathway, providing you do not gain any benefit (https://www.england.nhs.uk/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/cp-12.pdf), extract:


5. An individual who has chosen to pay privately for an element of their care,such as a diagnostic test, is entitled to access other elements of care as NHS- commissioned treatment, provided the patient meets NHS CB commissioning criteria for that treatment. However, at the point that the patient seeks to transfer back to NHS care:
&#61623; the NHS CB is at liberty to request the patient be reassessed by an NHS clinician
&#61623; the patient will not be given any preferential treatment by virtue of having accessed part of their care privately, AND
&#61623; the patient will be subject to standard NHS waiting times


There are other options... have a really good look at options on Choose and Book. There are plenty of providers to choose from who may have consultations sooner and shorter waiting lists. I know that most of the hospitals I work with are offering OP appointments within 2-3 weeks and surgery no more than 5-6 weeks after that. Some are even shorter.

[55palfers]

Definitely check out the Choose & Book route.

Mine was all booked on-line with the Dr of my choice.

[QuickQuack]

This used to be a loophole to be able to jump the queue for surgical procedures in the NHS but I'm afraid the rules have been changed a few years ago; transfers between the NHS and the private sector are now not allowed for the same problem. If you go private, you have to go private for the whole lot for that problem including scans and surgery. Even co-payment arrangements for expensive drugs are not allowed. Again in the past, if a particular drug was not allowed to be prescribed due to cost (quite a frequent problem in oncology [cancer medicine]), the patients used to get a private script from the NHS consultant and the rest of the care remained in the NHS. That is no longer allowed either.

I'm afraid the NHS isn't the same one it used to be 25 years ago.

[Sheepshanks]

fatboy b said:

I did this is reverse about 25 years ago. I buggered my knee playing squash. It took 6 weeks to see the consultant on the NHS, then I was piut on an 18 month waiting list. 2 months after the initial visit, I got a new job that had private healthcare. I got re-refered by the GP. < 2 weeks to see the same guy again, and operated on in 4 weeks.

That's not the same as the OP is talking about - you restarted the whole process from the beginning.

I'm amazed the insurer covered a pre-existing condition though!

[fatboy b]

Sheepshanks said:

fatboy b said:

I did this is reverse about 25 years ago. I buggered my knee playing squash. It took 6 weeks to see the consultant on the NHS, then I was piut on an 18 month waiting list. 2 months after the initial visit, I got a new job that had private healthcare. I got re-refered by the GP. < 2 weeks to see the same guy again, and operated on in 4 weeks.

That's not the same as the OP is talking about - you restarted the whole process from the beginning.

I'm amazed the insurer covered a pre-existing condition though!

That's why I said "I did this in reverse". Thr second "initial" consultation was literally a 2 minuate admin visit.

And corporate cover has clout apparently.

[Mattt]

Hindsight and all that - but just shows how important private healthcare is if you're self employed.

[foliedouce]

Interesting topic. I have a friend who is a surgeon for a niche area. His NHS waiting list is 6 months long, his private waiting list is 2 weeks for the same ops.

I find it strange that this anomaly can be allowed to happen, but that's why I pay for private healthcare for the family

[davepoth]

foliedouce said:

Interesting topic. I have a friend who is a surgeon for a niche area. His NHS waiting list is 6 months long, his private waiting list is 2 weeks for the same ops.

I find it strange that this anomaly can be allowed to happen, but that's why I pay for private healthcare for the family

It's not an anomaly; the NHS can only afford to fund a certain number of operations, so your surgeon friend will have quite a bit of spare time left over. It's that time which he uses to do private jobs, and because there is only a small number of people willing to pay extra, that waiting list is much shorter.

Back to the OP though; If your friend paid for the whole thing privately I'd have no concern - he wouldn't be disadvantaging anyone on the NHS, and in fact if he did have private insurance he'd be doing the NHS a favour by going private. He's paying for it twice.

However, by paying for the consultation and not the surgery he can move himself ahead of people who can't pay for the consultation. That isn't quite right in my mind, but if I was in the same situation I'd probably pay up and jump the queue.

[foliedouce]

davepoth said:

foliedouce said:

Interesting topic. I have a friend who is a surgeon for a niche area. His NHS waiting list is 6 months long, his private waiting list is 2 weeks for the same ops.

I find it strange that this anomaly can be allowed to happen, but that's why I pay for private healthcare for the family

It's not an anomaly; the NHS can only afford to fund a certain number of operations, so your surgeon friend will have quite a bit of spare time left over. It's that time which he uses to do private jobs, and because there is only a small number of people willing to pay extra, that waiting list is much shorter.

Back to the OP though; If your friend paid for the whole thing privately I'd have no concern - he wouldn't be disadvantaging anyone on the NHS, and in fact if he did have private insurance he'd be doing the NHS a favour by going private. He's paying for it twice.

However, by paying for the consultation and not the surgery he can move himself ahead of people who can't pay for the consultation. That isn't quite right in my mind, but if I was in the same situation I'd probably pay up and jump the queue.

In my world, I work the hours to get the job done, I don't get paid overtime, but I do earn a very decent salary. I don't have 'spare time' to do other paid jobs and even if I did, my employment contract would exclude it. Surgeons earn good six figure salaries from the NHS, yet still have plenty of spare time to earn more money. That, in my opinion, is an anomaly with most other professions, which if we could fix would help reduce NHS waiting times so the OPs question would not be relevant.

[foliedouce]

davepoth said:

foliedouce said:

Interesting topic. I have a friend who is a surgeon for a niche area. His NHS waiting list is 6 months long, his private waiting list is 2 weeks for the same ops.

I find it strange that this anomaly can be allowed to happen, but that's why I pay for private healthcare for the family

It's not an anomaly; the NHS can only afford to fund a certain number of operations, so your surgeon friend will have quite a bit of spare time left over. It's that time which he uses to do private jobs, and because there is only a small number of people willing to pay extra, that waiting list is much shorter.

Back to the OP though; If your friend paid for the whole thing privately I'd have no concern - he wouldn't be disadvantaging anyone on the NHS, and in fact if he did have private insurance he'd be doing the NHS a favour by going private. He's paying for it twice.

However, by paying for the consultation and not the surgery he can move himself ahead of people who can't pay for the consultation. That isn't quite right in my mind, but if I was in the same situation I'd probably pay up and jump the queue.

In my world, I work the hours to get the job done, I don't get paid overtime, but I do earn a very decent salary. I don't have 'spare time' to do other paid jobs and even if I did, my employment contract would exclude it. Surgeons earn good six figure salaries from the NHS, yet still have plenty of spare time to earn more money. That, in my opinion, is an anomaly with most other professions, which if we could fix would help reduce NHS waiting times so the OPs question would not be relevant.

[The_Doc]

foliedouce said:

davepoth said:

foliedouce said:

Interesting topic. I have a friend who is a surgeon for a niche area. His NHS waiting list is 6 months long, his private waiting list is 2 weeks for the same ops.

I find it strange that this anomaly can be allowed to happen, but that's why I pay for private healthcare for the family

It's not an anomaly; the NHS can only afford to fund a certain number of operations, so your surgeon friend will have quite a bit of spare time left over. It's that time which he uses to do private jobs, and because there is only a small number of people willing to pay extra, that waiting list is much shorter.

Back to the OP though; If your friend paid for the whole thing privately I'd have no concern - he wouldn't be disadvantaging anyone on the NHS, and in fact if he did have private insurance he'd be doing the NHS a favour by going private. He's paying for it twice.

However, by paying for the consultation and not the surgery he can move himself ahead of people who can't pay for the consultation. That isn't quite right in my mind, but if I was in the same situation I'd probably pay up and jump the queue.

In my world, I work the hours to get the job done, I don't get paid overtime, but I do earn a very decent salary. I don't have 'spare time' to do other paid jobs and even if I did, my employment contract would exclude it. Surgeons earn good six figure salaries from the NHS, yet still have plenty of spare time to earn more money. That, in my opinion, is an anomaly with most other professions, which if we could fix would help reduce NHS waiting times so the OPs question would not be relevant.

Most NHS Consultant surgeons make 5 figure salaries, not 6 and this is for 50+ hours a week, including non-negotiable nights and weekends. Eg working three out of 10 weekends and one in 10 nights on call. Maybe when you are 58 you might make £100,000

For the hours you put into it and the training and skills you have amassed, the exams taken and the comparative salaries in other sectors it is very bad pay-vs-skill on a global scale. All my friends from school who didn't do medicine make more money than me. I have taken progressively harder exams continually every three to four years from age 8 to age 38. Continually. Self-directed and career building.

Consultant pay rates http://bma.org.uk/support-at-work/pay-fees-allowan...

That said, the salaries are high and no-one has hungry children, so I'm not asking for sympathy. NHS Consultant contracts state that you have to give harder to the NHS the more private work you do, or words to that effect.

Consultants do private work along side their NHS work because:
a) you are self-employed on that side of it, with all the control that comes with that,
b) capitalism says a worker can work on whatever he wants,
and c) some of us are happy to work 70 hours a week for nice things. The fact that the NHS is underfunded and waiting lists are 6+ months plus has nothing to do with an individual consultant. I work friggin hard.