Insurers are increasingly influencing private medical practice and threatening consultants with being taken off their books, doctors have said.
However the British Medical Association (BMA) also believes demand for private medical treatment could increase with the implementation of NHS reforms. According to the BMA, half of its consultants have been challenged by insurers over their fees and one in ten threatened with being "derecognised". The subject of private medical insurance (PMI) providers dictating fees to medical practitioners is a highly sensitive one, with doctors suggesting insurers could in effect be restricting patient choice. And the problem peaked with the Office of Fair Trading's (OFT) decision to include i...
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