Patients are paying for surgeries covered by the province

Diagnostic tests $300.00 per eye Kate Armstrong wants her money back legally blind in one eye and barely seeing out of the other. In 20/22, she says a surgeon at a Toronto hospital told her if she went to his private for profit clinic she could get her cataract surgery faster. So she went and signed contracts she could barely see. How do you ask questions when you can’t read? Armstrong signed off on $1200 in diagnostic and measurement tests over 3000 for her first cataract surgery. And nearly 3500 for the second money the province would have paid, $8000 is not what I had then, and I had to borrow it and I had to cash in, Orders piece. Healthcare advocates say a growing number of Ontarians are in the same boat, all medically needed. Cataract surgery is covered. Every hospital can handle medically needed cataract surgeries. And if you’re being told anything else in a private clinic, that is not the truth. A single cataract surgery takes roughly. 7 minutes Currently in Ontario, the longest average wait time is 3 1/2 months. A CBC News investigation found the Ontario government pays public hospitals about $500 per surgery. It pays private clinics up to $1300.00 for the same work, so patients should not be charged. Ontario’s health minister insists few patients are using their credit cards and the numbers show it is a very, very small group that have to have that investigation. Ultimately get reimbursed when appropriate. And corrective action is taken. The most recent Health Canada numbers show for profit clinics charged Canadians nearly $80 million for medically necessary services. People are blindly excuse the pun, being ripped off. Armstrong won’t likely be reimbursed because she signed the contracts. She says the trust she wants placed in doctors is gone. Christine Birak, CBC News, Toronto.