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Private hospitals aren't giving their patients important price details, review finds

The institutions are not telling their patients beforehand how much their surgery could cost

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Private hospitals aren't giving their patients important price details, review finds

The city's biggest private hospitals are not providing their patients with comprehensive price information that can help them budget for simple operations.

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This emerged from a recent review by the , which was conducted after two patients complained about price disputes with their hospitals.

The result echoed an earlier warning from the Director of Audit, which said that "most private hospitals in the city could not provide comprehensive price information for their services", and that the government had been lax in regulating them.

Tim Pang Hung-cheong, a patients' rights advocate with the Society for Community Organisation, called on private hospitals to implement package charges - adding prices to the lists of procedures to be done and facilities to be used.

"Charges in private hospitals are imposed by two parties - the hospital and the doctor - but both have not been clear on their charges," he said.

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But Pang said he was not optimistic about the possibility of direct regulation by the government in a free market.

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