Health premiums on the rise

More than 100,000 Bay of Plenty residents made health insurance claims totalling $28.7 million through one of the country's biggest insurance companies.

The Bay figures reflect national statistics showing fewer New Zealanders have health insurance.

Figures released this week by the Health Funds Association of New Zealand show 5300 fewer Kiwis have health insurance, which the association said was pushing up premiums.

The number of Bay of Plenty claims to one of the biggest health insurance companies was decreasing but the total amount being paid out was on the rise.

Last year more than 100,000 Bay of Plenty residents made health insurance claims totalling $28.7 million through Southern Cross.

In 2012, more than 105,000 claims were made, with the total cost at $27.9 million and in 2011 more than 109,000 claims were made with the total cost of $26.8 million.

A $64,000 medical bill for a craniotomy was the largest payout made to a Bay of Plenty resident by Southern Cross Health Society in 2013.

Also in the top three most expensive claims were a valve replacement ($63,000) and a cardiac bypass.

Tauranga Budget Service service co-ordinator Diane Bruin recommended people got some basic health cover if they could afford it.

"Sometimes you need to have surgery sooner than later and you have to wait in the system," she said.

Staff regularly had people coming in seeking help after losing their job because of health problems, Ms Bruin said.

"We see so much of that happening. It is horrendous the amount of people we see sick and can't afford to feed the family. It puts so much pressure on the family. They just don't know what to do."

Bay of Plenty residents needing complicated and expensive procedures were sent to Waikato Hospital.

Waikato District Health Board surgery and cardiology, cardiothoracic and vascular services assistant group manager Paul Taumanu said waiting times for surgical procedures in the public system were less than five months and, depending on the severity of the condition, often much shorter than that.

"These particular operations are all quite complicated with large theatre teams, high consumable costs [valves, grafts, blood products, etc] and then relatively long recovery times post-procedure, with some of that time in intensive care or high dependency units requiring intensive nursing support," he said.

"In the past 12 months we did more than 300 cardiac bypass procedures, more than 200 valve replacement procedures and more than 50 craniotomies."

Nationally, Southern Cross Health Society paid $659 million on 2.3 million health insurance claims with 154,000 of these for surgical procedures.

Southern Cross Health Society chief executive Peter Tynan said the prices reflected the difficulty of the surgeries undertaken in private hospitals.