Medisave withdrawals for home palliative care to be expanded

SINGAPORE — To enhance support for end-of-life care, Medisave withdrawals for home palliative care will be expanded later this year to include day hospice services.

Similar to those getting home palliative care, day hospice patients diagnosed with terminal cancer or end-stage organ failure will not be subject to the withdrawal limit — set at S$2,500 in each patient’s lifetime —  if the claim is made from their own Medisave accounts.

Announcing this during the Ministry of Health’s Committee of Supply debate on Wednesday (April 13), Minister of State for Health Chee Hong Tat said the Ministry of Health (MOH) received three appeals on hospice care costs last year.

With the help of Government subsidies, charity assistance and Medisave, most patients do not face out-of-pocket payments for hospice and palliative care, he said.

Citing figures from financial years 2011 to 2015, Mr Chee said eight in 10 hospice residents do not have to make such payments. 

The median length of stay in hospices is 15 days. For home palliative care, where the median period of care is around two months, nine in 10 patients do not have to make out-of-pocket payments.

The MOH has taken steps to improve the affordability of end-of-life care over the past two years, Mr Chee said.

These include increasing funding for home palliative care providers in 2014 and increasing the Medisave withdrawal limit for inpatient hospice and home palliative care last year.

Last month, subsidies for eligible in-patient hospice patients were raised, while new subsidies were introduced for day hospice services.

Apart from calls for the authorities to enhance financing of palliative-care services, Members of Parliament, such as Dr Lily Neo, Dr Chia Shi-Lu and Ms Tin Pei Ling, also spoke about enhancing training for hospice care personnel and manpower challenges in the intermediate and long-term care sectors.