THE National Kidney Foundation (NKF) will add a $1.6 million bill to its annual spending to help two groups of its needy patients who have been slipping through the cracks.
The chairman of the country's largest charity, Mr Gerard Ee, said yesterday that $584,000 will be used to pay for all blood tests of its over 2,000 patients. This works out to about $300 savings a year for patients who undergo 10 blood tests a year.
Also, 60 dialysis patients with other medical conditions will be given $1 million worth of subsidies by the NKF to get treatment in private dialysis centres. The NKF centres are run by nurses and are not licensed to treat patients with more than one medical condition, in case complications develop while they are undergoing dialysis.
Previously, these patients would not be eligible for NKF subsidy. However, under the new scheme which started last month, patients with more than one medical condition who pass the means test set by the charity will receive about $2,000 to subsidise their dialysis fees in private treatment centres.
Speaking at the official opening of the Pei Hwa Foundation-NKF dialysis centre in Ang Mo Kio Avenue 3, Mr Ee said NKF has routinely had to turn people away because they are not licensed to treat them. 'These are poor people who slip through the net. They come to us seeking help and through no fault of theirs, we have to turn them away and they go away with no help,' he said. 'So we say, this cannot be right. Therefore, we have introduced this new portable subsidy.'
Mr Ee said the two new subsidies are the charity's way of ensuring that the needy 'do not slip through the gaps'.
The first recipient of the portable subsidy is diabetic Ng Teck Chiew, 62, who goes for his three-times-a-week sessions at East Shore Hospital's dialysis centres for free because of the subsidy.
Mr Ng was rejected for NKF subsidy when he applied over a year ago as he has diabetes and hypertension. He no longer has to worry about treatment costs. 'It's helped me a lot because I have no income and treatments are not cheap.'
Previously, he paid $200 per visit.
Applications for the new subsidy are now open. Patients previously rejected by the NKF because they have more than one medical condition can re-apply to see if they qualify.
The guest of honour at the opening of the Ang Mo Kio centre yesterday, Senior Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Balaji Sadasivan, said there were 3,953 people with kidney failure in Singapore last year, from over 1,000 just the year before. NKF serves over half of dialysis patients here, said Dr Balaji. Of these, over half pay between nothing and $50 a month for treatment, said Mr Ee.
The new dialysis centre - NKF's 24th dialysis centre - can serve 120 patients daily. It cost $1.5 million to set up, of which $1.25 million came from the Pei Hwa Foundation, a charitable organisation set up by alumni of the old Pei Hwa Public School.
This article was first published in The Straits Times on August 18, 2008.
