China sacks hospital officials after "sky-high" bill

BEIJING, Apr 30 (Reuters) China has sacked seven hospital officials and disciplined two others following a medical overcharging case that galvanised a nationwide outcry against ''sky-high'' healthcare bills, state media reported today.

The president and six staff of the Harbin Medical University No 2 Hospital in northeast China were dismissed after the Health Ministry and the State Council found the hospital had ''arbitrarily collected fees contrary to regulations'' and then altered records to hide the abuses, the Beijing News reported.

Soaring medical charges have become a widespread complaint in China, and the government has promised to cap medical charges.

But the bills the Harbin hospital charged to Weng Wenhui were so extravagant that they attracted nationwide media attention and provoked action from China's leadership.

The daily said an official investigation into Weng's case had found that the hospital charged his family 1.39 million yuan for 82 days treatment after the 75-year-old was admitted in May last year with a lymphatic tumour and then suffered complications.

Weng died on August 6, and his family later complained that they and his insurer were left with a hospital bill of 5.5 million yuan (6,000), including 4 million yuan for imported medicine that doctors urged the family to buy. The hospital charged for 1,180 diagnoses and blood transfusions, his son Weng Qiang said at the time.

Today's report did not explain the discrepancy in figures between the family's claims and the official findings.

The investigation by the Health Ministry and other agencies found that Weng was charged many times for the same tests, as well as for tests and medicines that he never received.

Intensive care unit staff later altered Weng's records to make the charges appear legitimate.

Health Minister Gao Qiang has promised to hold down medical bills, which are a sore point for many people. The government has also announced plans to extend medical insurance and ''budget'' hospital care.

But Today's announcement acknowledged that many Chinese have lost confidence in their doctors.

''The Harbin case of sky-high medical charges has seriously damaged the image of the healthcare profession and caused malign social consequences,'' the official notice on the case said, according to the Beijing News.

Health officials and hospitals ''should draw profound lessons from the case and treat it as a warning'', it said.

Hospital presidents will, without exception, be sacked in future cases of serious over-charging, it added.

Reuters SI VP0912