A budget cut of RM120 million for University Malaya Medical Centre (UMMC) this year is causing concern among several doctors over the hospital’s ability to give adequate treatment to patients.
They worry that patient care would be compromised after the teaching hospital’s budget for 2015 was reduced to RM387 million against an expenditure of RM510 million last year.
And as a teaching hospital, the cut would also affect the quality of education provided to medical students.
Patients, too, are worried, like Sally who depends on public healthcare which is far cheaper than private treatment.
The 21-year-old former waitress, who did not want to give her real name, said UMMC had been treating her for a life-threatening disease in 2013 and had waived the RM6,000 medical bill then after she lost her job as a result of falling ill.
But in February this year, she received a “red letter” instructing her to pay up RM3,000 within 14 days or face legal action, the former waitress told The Malaysian Insider.
“When I asked why I had to pay, the hospital said that they had no money and so they were claiming back what they were owed.
“So I stopped going to the hospital to get my medication for fear of being charged.”
But she returned to UMMC last week when the pain from the illness became too much to bear.
“I was in so much pain and decided I would go to the hospital and plead with them to let me pay RM100 a month because I badly needed treatment and my medication,” she said, bursting into tears.
Higher costs as teaching hospital
Universiti Malaya’s Dean of Medicine, Professor Dr Adeeba Kamarulzaman (pic), told The Malaysian Insider that UMMC was verbally informed of the budget cut earlier this year by the Education Ministry (MoE) which the hospital falls under as it is a teaching hospital.
She said the budget cut was expected to put a further strain on UMMC’s ability to provide patient care given that it was expecting a rise in the number of patients switching over from private hospitals following the implementation of the goods and services tax (GST) at 6%.
In addition, UMMC would be paying an estimated RM4 million in GST every month to suppliers.
Already operating under tight constraints, this is expected to exacerbate the chronic funding problem the hospital is facing.
Dr Adeeba said UMMC had to make do with a comparably smaller budget for its size, compared with hospitals under the Ministry of Health (MOH). This was despite the fact that it had to serve the public just like any other government hospital.
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UMMC’s RM120 million budget cut threatens patient care, training
18 April 2015 – TMI
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