Payments and invoices

After your hospital stay, you will not have to pay anything when you leave. Advance payments are never requested, except for aesthetic procedures or for patients who are not registered with a Belgian health insurance fund. In this case, you pay the advance to the hospital by bank transfer no later than two weeks prior to the operation. You will find the details for this on your informed consent form.

The invoice will either be sent by post to your home address or sent to you electronically by e-mail (if we have your e-mail address on record). You will typically receive your invoice within seven weeks after the end of the month in which you were discharged from the hospital. Only if your rmedical recors can be completed.

Be advised that you will receive a hospital invoice when you come for a consult at your doctor's private practice and/or if there is an examination or sample collection at our hospital laboratory. In certain specialist cases (e.g. molecular biology), our laboratory forwards the sample to another lab. If so, you may receive an invoice from Gent University Hospital or Antwerp University Hospital.

You must pay your invoice within 30 days of the issue date. If your invoice has not been paid within that period, a conventional compensation of 10%, with a minimum of €25.00, is legally due without notice of default. In addition, interest equal to the legal interest rate plus 2% will be payable from the due date.

You will receive a payment reminder by text message should the invoice remain unpaid. In that case, the invoice might have ended up in your spam folder .

After your stay, you will receive your hospital invoice. The form of this document and the information it contains are entirely determined by the government.

On the first page of your invoice, you will find a summary of all costs. Your mandatory health insurance pays a large part of your costs directly to the hospital. This amount is also communicated for your information on this first sheet, at the bottom of the summary. There are three columns:

Your invoice is further detailed into the following sections:

Would you like to know what your physician's status regarding the health insurance fund is? You can find this information on your physician's contact page.

Every two years, the government, physicians' associations and health insurance funds conclude a convention (or agreement) on official physicians’ fees. Since the profession of medical physician is a liberal profession, any physician can choose whether or not to accept this convention.

There are three types of status: physicians who are fully covered by agreement with the health insurance fund, physicians who are not covered by agreement with the health insurance fund and physicians who are partially covered by agreement with the health insurance fund.

The cost of the room per day is paid by the RIZIV (National Institute for Sickness and Disability Insurance). The patient pays the co-payment and additional surcharges. You also pay part of the contractual fee (statutory amount). This depends on your mandatory health insurance and hospitalisation insurance.

If you are staying in a single room, the physician may charge a fee supplement. The fee (or honorarium) is the fee charged by physicians, dentists, physiotherapists, midwives or speech therapists for their services.

Your choice of room does not affect the quality of care or treatment. The difference only has to do with more comfort and greater privacy.

• These fee supplements apply for your attending physician as well as for other physicians involved in your operation or treatment.
• The compulsory health insurance (or health insurance fund) does not intervene in the cost of these fee supplements. Depending on your insurance policy, your hospitalisation
  insurance will cover (part of) these fee supplements.
• The maximum fee supplement in our hospital is 0% in a patient room with two or more patient beds and 150% in a single or luxury room. Even in the outpatients clinic, a physician without an agreement with a health insurance fund can charge a fee supplement of up to 150%.

(*) You can find more about the physician's status further up.
(**) Your social status is communicated by your mandatory health insurance, e.g. chronically sick, long-term unemployed older than 50 years...

Room supplements also apply when you opt for a single room:

• 65 € per day for an ordinary single room (= VAT exempt)
• 85 € per day for a single room in the maternity ward (standard room) (= VAT exempt)
• 160 € per day for a luxury single room in the Maternity Unit (in Maria Middelares General Hospital only)
• 0 € per day for a single room on the children's ward

You also pay an accommodation flat fee, a fixed amount for the use of e.g. television, WiFi, water... This flat rate is €8 per day (= price incl. VAT).

To cancel your appointment, contact your physician’s secretariat. You may cancel your booked appointment up to 24 hours in advance.

If you cancel later or not at all, you will be charged a flat fee of €25.00. Any exceptions to this rule are listed on the department's appointment page.

If a family member or loved one is admitted to our hospital, you may indicate that you want to accompany them during their hospital stay. The hospital offers you the option of overnighting in the following situations:

• you are a parent or family member of a child that is admitted to the Paediatrics Ward
  
• you are the partner of a mum admitted to the Maternity unit
• you are the mum of a baby admitted to the Neonatology Ward.

Chairs are available that fold out into beds. For personal hygiene, you can use the bathroom of the patient room you are staying in (e.g. in paediatrics). In Maria Middelares General Hospital, some other wards have a separate ward shower available. Ask a nurse for the details on this.

This hotel service carries a number of charges:

• staying in the patient’s room: €15.00
• staying in a separate patient room: 65.00 €

The extra drinks, meals or snacks ordered will also come on the room's bill. Refer to the document below for an indication of prices.

For inquiries, please contact the head nurse of the nursing ward.

List of the most requested products and services at Maria Middelares General Hospital

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Check out some useful documents related to your bill below.