NHIA holds health screening in Tamale

The Northern Regional Office of the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) in collaboration with the Tamale Metropolitan Office of NHIS has held a day’s health screening exercise for Tamale residents.

The health screening exercise was preceded by a float that saw members of the public and officials of NHIA in the region on a float through some principal streets before converging at the Tamale Jubilee Park for the screening exercise.

The exercise, held on Tuesday, formed part of activities to mark the 10th Anniversary Celebration of the NHIS, which is on the theme: “Towards Universal Health Coverage: Increasing Enrolment whilst Ensuring Sustainability.”

Alhaji Hudu Iddrisu, Northern Regional Manager of the NHIA, said “The future is bright and promising as the scheme gears towards universal coverage and further improvements.”

Alhaji Iddrisu said the NHIA would this year implement two major projects which Biometric Registration and Instant Identity Card Issuance and E-Claims to eliminate delays in accessing membership cards as well as prevent impersonation, a situation where non-registered members attend hospital using cards of their relatives.

He said “The E-Claims will allow providers to send their claims electronically to Central Processing Center for processing and help eliminate the paper claims which are very expensive and difficult to archive.”

He said the NHIS encountered a number of challenges in the last decade but assured stakeholders that all was being done to ensure its (NHIS) improvement.

The NHIS, which was born on September 5, 2003, has grown from a membership base of over one million subscribers to nearly nine million active subscribers in 2012 and utilization rising to about 25 million.

Source: GNA