A team consisting of representatives of the Department of Public Health and Cabinet of the minister responsible for public health, conducted a small study to determine to what extent the provisions outlined in the Ordinance regulating the transition of country status (overgangsverordening) can be used to adopt the tariffs for medical care provided in the SEHOS to the St. Maarten Medical Center (SMMC). In line with the results of the study, Minister of Public Health Social Development & Labor, Cornelius de Weever signed the ministerial decree on SMMC tariffs on November 18, 2011.
"SMMC can continue to expand the services and hire the necessary staff to do so. I believe that this will reduce the cost and inconvenience of having to travel abroad for these other medical services that are not available on St. Maarten," said Minister de Weever.
The study concluded that:
1. SMMC and SEHOS were both regarded as equivalent hospitals by means of national decree
2. SEHOS is to be regarded as the national hospital of the former Netherlands Antilles
3. In accordance to art. 7 of the transitional ordinance, the minister have the mandate to designate the SMMC as the body which replaces SEHOS. This ultimately entails that the rates established for services provided in SEHOS can also be applied to the SMMC.
In July 2010, the SMMC was granted a license by the executive council of the former island territory, to initiate the first phase of the expansion plans of the medical center. In their expansion request, the medical center indicated that the expansion would eventually lead to a reduction in the country’s health care expenditures, as services and treatment that is currently unavailable would be made available locally. The expansion in services would include amongst others: cardiology, urology and neurology.
Consequently, the expansion has led to the need in establishing tariffs for this specialty.
In accordance to the ordinance of health insurance, which outlines the regulations of the Social security insurance, fees for the provision of medical care are to be established by means of national decree. That decree which was transferred to country St. Maarten, stipulates the fees for specialized hospital care, however the fees were specified per hospital, in other words, fees applicable to medical care provided in e.g. SEHOS of Curacao, were not always in line with those of SMMC. Additionally, the fees/tariffs were only established for care that was provided in the various hospitals. Consequently, it was not possible to automatically assume that those tariffs would be applicable to SMMC after 10/10/10.