FURTHER BENEFITS

Grey River Argus, 25 July 1941, Page 3

FURTHER BENEFITS

SOCIAL SECURITY ACT \ Free X-Ray Services P.A. WELLINGTON. July 24. Further benefits under the Social Security Act have been announced by the Hon. A. H. Nordmeyer, Minister of Health. The Minister explained new X-Ray Diagnostic feervices Regulations. These are pun* lished in to-night’s Gazette. These Regulations, Re said, provide that the following types of work will, as from a date appointed by tne Minister, be done at the cost of the Social Security Fund, except when they are required for dental purposes or for the purposes of. life insurance: — . The making of X-ray examinations with the aid of the fluorescent screen. , , The taking of X-ray photographs. The supply and administration of any drugs or other substances for the purposes of any such examination or photograph. The provision of medical services incidental to any such examination or photograph, except medical services of a kind that are not ordinarily performed by radiologists as such (whether, in any particular case, such, services are performed by the radiologist or by any other medical practitioner). The provision of any other incidental services for the purposes of any such examinations of photographs. X-ra’y services will be available on the written recommendation of the medical practitioner (other than one performing service), at the hands of doctors engaged or employed by a Hospital Board, or of radiologists who are recognised for this purpose by the Minister of Health. Such recognition of radiologists may be either absolute, entitling the radiologist to perform at the cost of the Social Security Fund any of the numerous types ef service provided for in the Regulations, or it may be limited to certain specified services, according to the qualifications of, and the plant available, to the radiologist. Radiologists operating under the regulations are required to keep records of the work they do, and to retain them for not less than three years. A schedule to the Regulations sets out the fees which are to be allowed for different classes of work. In the case of work done in a public hospital, these fees (which are not payable in respect of in-patients, as radiological treatment for them is already provided for under the Social Security Act), will cover the whole cost of the work done, but, In the case of a private radiologist, they may be accepted in full or partial satisfaction of his claim, and the Minister may withhold payment if he is of opinion that any fee charged by such a radiologist is excessive.