HNY Policy and Pathway Repository - North Yorkshire
Planned follow-up care after private surgery in the UK or abroad (not routinely commissioned)
For the treatment of
Follow-up care needs during a single care episode of care (including bariatric, cosmetic and other surgery)
Commissioning position
This intervention is not commissioned and therefore should not be routinely offered to patients. Application for funding approval can be made, using the IFR process, by the clinician recommending the intervention, if their assessment is that there are exceptional reasons why their patient could benefit from it.
Emergency care for complications after surgery is commissioned, where necessary.
Summary of rationale
A patient is entitled to transfer from private to NHS care for the same condition but is not entitled to mix elements of NHS and private care in the same episode of care following surgery.
The duration of an episode of care will vary according to the surgery undertaken but is the recognised period that a person should remain under follow up by a specialist service that has carried out surgical treatment.
In the case of bariatric surgery, the episode of care by a specialist service following surgery is defined as two years, so people choosing to have bariatric surgery will need to fund all aspects of that period of follow-up care from a suitable specialist service, including medication and nutritional supplements. That care is not commissioned from NHS specialist services or NHS GP services. Once patients have reached the end of their privately funded bariatric (or other surgery) after-care follow up, they will have access to the same monitoring and treatment support as patients who have received bariatric (or other surgery) care in the NHS.
Private providers in the UK are expected to include the full episode of care provision (e.g. two years after bariatric surgery) in their contract with the patient but a patient choosing private surgery needs to confirm that this is included. When a patient chooses to have private surgery outside the UK it is unlikely this after-care follow up will be part of their contract with the provider. If it is not, they also need to arrange after-care follow up for the full episode of care with a private specialist provider in the UK.
There is access to NHS funded surgical treatment in EU, Norway, Iceland, Liechtenstein or Switzerland if a person fulfils certain eligibility criteria and, in that case, they are also eligible for NHS funded follow-up care.
References
Associated Pathways
Specialties
Places covered by
- East Riding
- Hull
- North East Lincolnshire
- North Lincolnshire
- North Yorkshire
- Vale of York