LAOAG CITY, June 10 – Officials of the Philippine Health Insurance Corporation said payment of claims from the hospitals in the province are processed on time contrary to reports of delayed payments.

Ilocos Norte’s Philhealth Officer Jerelin Felipe said their field office takes 45 days to process and pay the claims of the hospitals in the province, which is 15 days earlier than the 60 day-allowable period to process it.

She said the province was not affected over the brewing threat from the Private Hospitals Association of the Philippines (PHAP) to collect bills from the confined patients – members of the Philhealth care program.

The warning of the PHAP stemmed from the alleged existence of P386 million in account payable by the Philhealth to their hospitals-members.

“The problem will not apply in our field office because we are one of the top provinces nationwide having the fastest processing period on Philhealth claims of our local hospitals,” she said.

To date, the province has a total of 17 Philhealth accredited hospitals where nine are government–run hospitals and the rest are private hospitals.

The Philhealth also accredited a total of 26 Rural Health Units (RHU); 20 TB DOTS and seven maternity health care clinic all in Ilocos Norte.

PhilHealth Information Officer Raymund Domingo said that PhilHealth care members in Ilocos Norte had already reached 130,000.

He said that at least four persons are the average qualified dependents of every PhilHealth care member.

Domingo made the report during the weekly radio program of the Philippine Information Agency – Ilocos Norte’s (PIA-Ilocos Norte’s) aired live over DWFB Radyo ng Bayan- Laoag recently. (FREDDIE G. LAZARO)