The medical professionals in the CREDISALUD network provide health services ranging from general medicine, to gynecology-obstetrics, to general surgery, and more. For surgical cases CREDISALUD has established alliances with private clinics in order to use their installations and equipment, although the surgeries themselves are performed by doctors of CREDISALUD.
Health Financing
Taking into account the needs of a portion of the attended population, 5 years ago CREDISALUD began offering health for credit, allowing the patients to pay just for a percentage of the cost of service ( generally 25 or 50%). Later the patients can pay for services and care received under payment plans which vary by the patient’s repay capacity, without the addition of any interest rate. The payments follow up is a responsibility of the economical unit at CREDISALUD and are principally offered in cases of surgery. Collateral can take the form of material possessions, documents, personal or familial cosignatories, stable employment, telephone lines, etc. according to each patient’s economic condition. Direct loans can range from $100 (US) to the quantity necessary to pay for major surgery and are always based upon the patient’s collateral and the urgency of the case. At times, the costs are entirely covered by the center following a social evaluation.
CREDISALUD currently has the funding necessary to offer credits for between 70 and 80 major surgeries a year, but patient demand has exceeded this capacity. For this reason they have recently established an alliance with EMPRENDER, a financial institution, through which patients of CREDISALUD can have access to larger credit amounts in order to cover major health costs. In these cases the collateral and interest rates are determined by EMPRENDER. Credit services are combined with down payments for health services, resulting in a type of cross-subsidization in some situations.
