Doctors’ fees

Press, Volume CXII, Issue 33067, 7 November 1972, Page 18

Doctors’ fees

Sir, —Peter Lee must have the same doctor as I have. Just before the announcement that Government subsidies to doctors was being increased and that doctors would be reducing their fee to the patient accordingly, my doctor increased his fee by 50c—to $2.50. So now he can reduce it to $2, collect the extra from the Government as from today, and be 50c a visit better off. The patient gets no benefit at all. I will still be paying $2 a visit, as before the increased benefit, which is all being pocketed by the doctor. It is high time the Medical Association had some means of disciplining its members. I do not begrudge a doctor his fee for service, but fair’s fair, after all.—Yours, etc., MUGGINS. November 1, 1972. [Dr B. Heyward, liaison officer of the Canterbury division of the Medical Association of New Zealand, replies: “The Medical Association already has adequate means for disciplining members of the profession. The method of complaint for a person dissatisfied with a doctor’s fee was clearly set out in ‘The Press’ of November 2. The disciplinary committee referred to in this article is a statutory body created by the Medical Practitioners Act. I can assure your correspondents that if the correct procedure is followed an investigation of all complaints rewill nIAC.A ”1