Health board wrote off £0.6m owed for care after accidents

THE Western Health Board wrote off £600,000 which it was owed by patients who received treatment after road traffic accidents, the Dail Committee of Public Accounts has been told.

A further £1.1 million remained unpaid at the end of last July, the chief executive officer of the WHB, Mr Eamonn Hannon, told the committee.

Mr Hannon said the board hoped to collect most of the outstanding money. New systems had been put in place, to the extent that some patients were complaining that they were scarcely out of hospital before their bills arrived.

The committee was told that at the end of 1994, £3.6 million was due from patients, most of it for hospital maintenance and in patient charges. In addition, £3.2 million was owed for road traffic cases.

The Comptroller and Auditor General, Mr John Purcell, said the operation of the payment system in the hospitals "left a lot to be desired". Committee members would experience a sense of deja vu from dealing with the accounts of other health boards.

Mr Purcell said that in the course of audit some weaknesses in controls over the management of patients' accounts were noted. In one hospital, monthly control accounts were not maintained, although the facility was available on the computer system. This had since been rectified.

In one hospital the outstanding amounts due in respect of road traffic accidents came to £1.9 million at the end of 1994. Because these were not reviewed in time, many of the debts might have become statute barred.

Mr Hannon said this was not the case. Reminders had been issued and in many cases money had been received for the amounts due.

The board is also owed almost £100,000 by Galway County Council for paying the costs of providing supplementary welfare. These debts were still due, even though the board first took legal action to recover the money as far back as 1985.

The committee chairman, Mr Denis Foley, said 35 staff had earned more than £10,000 in overtime payments in 1994. He asked how one member of staff had managed to earn almost £28,000 in overtime.

Mr Hannon replied that the staff member concerned was a laboratory technician on a basic pay of £18,400, but had taken on all the on call work in the university hospital in Galway.

Mr Foley asked whether the board intended continuing to fund the Lesbian Line in Galway, which received a £3,500 grant in 1994.

Mr Hannon replied that the application, which was properly submitted, was a once off.

Mr Eric Byrne, Democratic Left, remarked that the chairman seemed to be surprised there were lesbians in Galway.

Mr Foley: "I wasn't, I was only querying the amount.

"Can I take it you're not discrimination against male homosexuals?" said Mr Byrne.

Mr Hannon: "No, we're not."