Health insurers and brokers have broadly supported the Office of Fair Trading's (OFT) view that the private healthcare market is ‘not working well for customers'.
However concerns have been raised that the OFT's review does not go far enough or the problems identified will be ‘very challenging' for it to address.
As COVER revealed, the OFT released preliminary results of its review of the private healthcare market that highlighted issues around information transparency for patients and the apparently cozy relationship between hospitals and consultants.
Steve Foulsham, technical services manager at the British Insurance Brokers Association (Biba), said the body had been worried about the lack of choice available for sometime.
"We welcome the study, but will be interested to see the next steps because I have some concerns that it just doesn't go far enough," he said.
"They've had a sample of 40 patient interviews, but with the best will in the world that's insignificant in real terms when trying to address the problems that are out there.
"So I think it needs to be ramped up in quite some way because customers need choices and we need to ensure that these choices are well documented and understood before the time they get to a claim," he added.
Foulsham also called on private medical insurance (PMI) providers to play their part in the process too.
"If the leading insurers told hospitals they wanted greater transparency I think that's the way for it to work."
The provisional findings also noted that local monopolies of hospital groups were artificially inflating PMI premiums by allowing providers access to isolated solus hospitals.
Howard Hughes, head of employer marketing at Simplyhealth, agreed with Foulsham's view and told COVER that tackling this issue could be difficult.
"Anything about increased transparency and comparability regarding quality and price information we absolutely welcome, because informed customers and informed patients is a great idea," he said.
"But some of these things seem very challenging from the OFT's point of view. For example, with solus hospitals, what do you do about that?
"The reason why there are solus hospitals is the catchment area will only supply that volume of patients, so there are some structural problems," he added.
Hughes also suggested the NHS would increase its provision to provide more choice for private patients and acknowledged that information asymmetry was a key factor to address as many people just accept what their GP says.
Part of targeting this issue may require outside bodies (such as the Royal College of Surgeons or General Medical Council) to agree standards for various procedures that could then be assessed.
"First you have to define what quality means," Hughes continued.
"For consultants who look like they have bad outcomes it might be because they are taking on the most difficult work, so information asymmetry is not the most simple thing to address because you have to be able to analyse and evaluate what the information is."
Other PMI providers have approved of the progress made by the OFT so far.
Mark Noble, health and group risk director, Aviva UK Health, said the insurer welcomed and supported any initiatives that help to ensure the private healthcare industry continues to deliver affordable solutions.
"Following consultation with a number of our intermediary partners and customers, we submitted our recommendations to the OFT and are pleased to see that many of the areas we raised have now been incorporated into the review.
"We remain committed to this process and will continue to offer our opinions and support the OFT throughout its review," he said.
Dr. Natalie-Jane Macdonald, managing director at Bupa Health and Wellbeing, added: "We strongly support the OFT market and are actively engaging with the OFT on behalf of our customers, because improved competition among hospitals and consultants will help deliver better value, higher quality private healthcare.
"As an organisation with no shareholders, we are committed to improving choice and control in healthcare for consumers."
