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I was approached by a newly qualified SMAE foot health practitioner who asked me the following:
'Should I come across patients who may benefit from a biomechanical assessment I will require someone to refer them to. Would there be any scope for me to refer prospective patients to you should I come across them and, if so, would there be a possibility we could come to an agreement of a referral fee/commission?'.
I said yes to referrals but no to referral fee/commission. I receive referrals from many other health professionals who have never asked for a fee, and who refer on the basis of patient needing my expertise rather than the practitioner getting a financial reward in return.I would not be comfortable with such an arrangement. I question if such an agreement would be ethical in any case. I'd be grateful for other private practitioners thoughts on this.
Many thanks
Helen

 

I refer to a more experienced woman a lot of the time, the patient gets an excellent service, and I do not ask for a referral fee. I think that this FHP needs to live in the real world!

 

Hi,
On the basis that I refer when it is in the patients best interest and I have never expected a fee from the practitioner I would not expect to pay a third party to refer to me. Ultimately any fee charged is paid by the patient. I do charge for some letters as they take time to compose and cost to print, I inform the patient of this when they ask for such a letter. As for commision, your fees reflect your professional responsibility and skills not the referees why would you pay them? Bottom line: if they wish to charge the patient a fee for referral then it is down to them to recover such fees direct from the patient not you.:D

 

Kickbacks are illegal in most countries.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kickback_(bribery)

 

I don't think it's illegal but certainly unethical. Bit of a cheek!

 

When I started in practice in the 1970s as a Smae trained chiropodist, there were certain conditions requiring LA that I needed to refer on. It wasn't very often, but it did happen. But I would never consider asking for a referral fee - I think I would have got a flea in my ear if I'd tried. My referral was, in a sense, part of my caring for the patient. They usually came back to me anyway for more basic treatment, so I never lost out and had a good relationship with a couple of SRCh's who had LA qualifications - which was not universal at that time. So I would agree with the OP.

 

There was a doctors co-operative a few years ago in NSW who had a fairly widespread program of demanding volume based payments, purportedly under the threat of withdrawal of all business albeit evidence of this was hard to come by. I believe the scheme went bankrupt once people understood what was happening which suggests most health practitioners find the practice distasteful. The Medical Board at the time issued warnings against the practice.

There was also this case http://netk.net.au/MedicalBoard/Board2.asp in which a physio was disciplined by the registration board for seeking commissions. My advice is don't touch it.