New Minister of Public Health Altagracia Guzman Marcelino reports that debt carried by the Ministry is at RD$7 billion. A source told Diario Libre that the commitments include arrears with public hospitals, medicines and suppliers. When her predecessor, Freddy Hidalgo Nunez took over in 2012 a debt of more than RD$1 billion was left by his predecessor, Bautista Rojas Gomez.
The debt at the Ministry increased significantly after the Medina administration stopped public hospitals from charging patients the so-called “recovery fee” that helped hospital cash flow. The elimination of the fee also resulted in an increase in patients demanding services at the hospital.
To improve cash flow at the hospitals, new Minister Guzman has said that priority will be given to integrating the hospitals with health providers (ARS), both private and public. Guzman is the former director of the government health provider, Senasa.
“We need the authorities of every hospital to commit and implement all that is necessary to sell services and bill the health providers, even if they start only with Senasa”, she said, as reported in Diario Libre.
http://www.diariolibre.com/noticias/2014/10/15/i838001_trasciende-que-ministerio-salud-pblica-debe-rd7-mil-millones.html