2 hours ago
1
Upgrade to High-Speed Internet for only ₱1499/month!
Enjoy up to 100 Mbps fiber broadband, perfect for browsing, streaming, and gaming.
Visit Suniway.ph to learn
Rhodina Villanueva - The Philippine Star
March 13, 2026 | 12:00am
The Private Hospitals Association of the Philippines Inc. (PHAPI) said PhilHealth advised them to hire a service provider capable of installing the EMR, which cost they would have to shoulder.
STAR / Ernie Peñaredondo, file
MANILA, Philippines — Some 800 private hospitals will be barred from participating in the Philippine Health Insurance Corp. (PhilHealth)’s Yaman ng Kalusugan program (YAKAP) if they fail to install an electronic medical records (EMR) system by June this year.
The Private Hospitals Association of the Philippines Inc. (PHAPI) said PhilHealth advised them to hire a service provider capable of installing the EMR, which cost they would have to shoulder.
“PhilHealth is requiring the health facilities to have our own EMR to be able to enroll in YAKAP but they want us to subscribe to a private provider. Hospitals are complaining that it is an additional expense for them,” PHAPI president Dr. Jose Rene de Grano said.
PhilHealth’s YAKAP is a national primary care benefit package offering free, comprehensive outpatient services, including consultations, laboratory tests, cancer screening and essential medicines to members.
Based on PhilHealth Circular (2025-0017), the eKonsulta system (eKon) which YAKAP is replacing will be decommissioned by July 1, 2026.
The eKon was intended as a temporary mechanism and it can no longer adequately support data processing requirements, consequently the pending expansion of YAKAP.
However, PHAPI lamented that installing the EMR would mean payment by hospitals of close to P400,000 each to a service provider.
“Hospitals across the country are already financially burdened. They are struggling with rising operational costs, delayed reimbursements and now the rising cost of supplies due to the Middle East conflict,” said De Grano.
The group stressed that hospitals should not be penalized for PhilHealth’s failure to provide cost-free solutions as mandated by law.
“PhilHealth’s threat to bar hospitals from Yakap participation if they fail to install EMR is coercive and unfair,” said PHAPI.
De Grano added that imposing an additional expense is unreasonable and contrary to the spirit of the Universal Health Care (UHC) Law.
Citing Section 36 of the Implementing Rules and Regulations (IRR) of the UHC Act (Republic Act 11223), PHAPI said the Department of Health (DOH) and PhilHealth shall fund and engage providers to develop and upgrade information systems, which may be availed at no cost to health care providers.”
The responsibility for funding and ensuring interoperability lies with the DOH and PhilHealth, not with financially strained hospitals.
Hospitals cannot be expected to shoulder expenses that compromise their ability to deliver patient care,” the PHAPI chief said.
