USKO`s medical e-commerce division, MediSwitch, has entered into an alliance with the Namibia-based HealthCare Information Technology (HIT), as its exclusive business partner for the provision of real-time electronic switching of all claims and data to the Namibian healthcare industry. The planned rollout to more than 70% of the Namibian medical practices before mid-year 2000, will enable some 300 healthcare service providers with full MediSwitch functionality.
"This relationship," explains Rob Abraham, MD of MediSwitch, "will open up the Southern African healthcare market, enabling medical practitioners in Namibia to claim electronically from South African medical schemes, and also enabling South African doctors to claim electronically from schemes in Namibia."
Through HIT, Mediswitch will roll out its electronic switch functionality to all service providers in the Namibian market, including pharmacies, medical practitioners, dentists, opticians and private and state hospitals. HIT has already MediSwitch enabled 12 pilot sites in Namibia across the spectrum of the service provider market.
According to Bertus Struwig, CEO of HIT, MediSwitch`s full API technology will speed up payment of claims for Namibians who regularly visit South Africa for medical treatment. "MediSwitch will also eliminate the risk of fraudulent use of funds through its eligibility checking function, as well as improve booking and benefit confirmation."
Struwig forecasts that by mid-2000 more than 200 000 electronic transactions a month could be carried through the Namibian switch. Currently more than 90% of all medical invoicing in the Namibian healthcare market is paper driven, claimed by mail and manually processed by medical aid administrators for payment.
HIT is an IT solutions provider to more than 80% of the medical practitioners in Namibia and represents all the major practice management software (PMS) vendors in the market.
"HIT provides a one -top IT solution that includes IT hardware, technical and software support," explains Struwig. "Because of our close relationship with the medical industry, we are well positioned to expand our operations in the healthcare e-commerce market," he concludes.
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