The National Healthcare Security Administration (NHSA) has released a draft proposal titled “Notice on Carrying out Special Treatment of Oral Implant Medical Service Charges and Consumables Prices,” seeking public feedback until August 27, 2022. The initiative aims to address issues such as irregular charges and heavy cost burdens in the oral implant field, ensuring public access to high-quality, efficient, and affordable missing tooth restoration services.
Standardizing Pricing Methods
Public medical institutions providing dental implant services will adopt a “service items + special consumables” pricing method. When implementing the “separation of technology and consumables,” the project price should be reduced by deducting the average online procurement price of related consumables. Dental implant crowns will be procured online and sold at a “zero markup” rate on the actual purchase price. Each provincial healthcare security bureau will issue a document before the end of 2022 to standardize and integrate local price items.
Strengthening Price Control
Local healthcare security bureaus will focus on single conventional planting and set price control objectives for the entire process. The price of implant placement surgery and crown placement will be controlled at about 60% of the total cost, while the proportion of inspection and design costs will be controlled at about 10%. By the end of 2022, all provincial healthcare security bureaus should complete the price adjustment of dental implant medical services.
Volume-Based Procurement (VBP) of Dental Implant Consumables
The Sichuan Provincial Healthcare Security Administration will lead the establishment of an inter-provincial procurement alliance for dental implant consumables. Each province will organize public and private medical institutions to report their procurement demands. Public medical institutions that refuse to report the volume or report less than 80% of the actual use in the previous year will face differentiated price policies.
Comprehensive Management of Dental Implant Charges
Local healthcare security bureaus will establish an abnormal price warning system for oral implants and publish a list of medical institutions with pricing complaints or significantly higher prices than the local average. The special governance has been launched in August 2022.-Fineline Info & Tech
