Hospital costs

ViniciusD

Hi all,

My mother in law came to Ireland to help me and my wife with our baby that is due next week. For our surprise 2 days after she got here she started to feel pretty bad.

Long history short: she is in the hospital since Friday and the ETA for for her to be discharged is next Friday. She is non-EU and Mater hospital charges €1,223 euros per night. In total it will be 7 nights, in other words €8561, what is pretty scaring.

Here are the questions that I need help with:

- we bought a travel insurance (GTA) before she came to Ireland, but I am not sure what amount they will cover. In case they don't cover anything or just a partial amount, is this bill hers or they can route it to me? I am resident in Ireland;
- she has gone under several heart procedures (no surgery). Is this €1,223 the maximum that she needs to pay per night or it will still incur extra charges for procedures, materials, etc.. ?
- In case we must pay something and we don't have the money, how to proceed?

Any advice is very welcome! Thanks!

tricky D

Moved to Pregnant for better answers.

ViniciusD

Sure that "Pregnancy complaints" is the correct forum? My mother in law is not pregnant.

jlm29

I'm pretty sure this is in the wrong forum too! The costs might be capped at a certain amount. Nobody can really know what it will cost without knowing the details of your travel insurance, and different hospitals will have different costs as well.
The best thing you can do is to contact whoever sold you the travel insurance to establish what is covered. You can also phone the accounts dept of the hospital to establish what their costs will be.
I doubt the bill will fall to you, but I suppose it depends what country your mother in law came from, visa arrangements etc, but someone else might know more about that

Miaireland

I can't see anyone here being able to give you advice. You need to contact the Insurance company or get the Hospital to do the same. A lot will come down ti her medical history prior to buying the Insurance and what was declared

tricky D

ViniciusD wrote: »

Sure that "Pregnancy complaints" is the correct forum? My mother in law is not pregnant.

Apols for the mix up. Hopefully a local mod will clean up my mess.

Tom Mann Centuria

Bed charge is all you pay, there is no itemised fee for imaging or bloods etc.

Orion

Miaireland wrote: »

I can't see anyone here being able to give you advice. You need to contact the Insurance company or get the Hospital to do the same. A lot will come down ti her medical history prior to buying the Insurance and what was declared

I think this is the best answer you're going to get. Without a lot more details - details you shouldn't provide in a public forum - We have no way of telling what her cover is. There is no forum on boards that would cover this query that I can see.

Neyite

Contact the insurer as soon as possible if you haven't already done so. They really should be coordinating your mother's care with the hospital, but it's likely that the hospital would also contact them.

Anyway, what an insurer normally does is pass the case to a medical assistance company here in Ireland - experts in this kind of thing and they will ensure that she gets the right treatment. There are additional factors to consider with cardiac patients abroad because of fitness-to-fly so while she might be discharged from the hospital, she may not be cleared medically to fly at that point. In which case a policy might cover day to day expenses for extension of her stay due to medical reasons.

If you are her next of kin then they can discuss the plan of treatment with you. They can also email you her policy documents so you can read them for yourself. Normally there is an excess to pay, then the insurer covers the rest but the policy document should let you know her specific cover, and in my experience the insurers are pretty friendly and helpful in medical claims.

Best of luck.

ViniciusD

Thanks for the replies.

The travel insurance covered the costs.

Just FYI: Mater hospital charges the bed per night. The cost for non-eu is €1223 euros/night.

Toots

Thank god for travel insurance! Hope she makes a full recovery