The Endometriosis Clinic 

Once you have decided upon surgery we will produce a treatment plan outlining your symptoms and problems, and what we plan to do about it, along with quotations for hospital, surgical and anaesthetic fees. To confirm a hospital fee quotation valid for 3 months you will need to email selfpaypgh@hcahealthcare.co.uk with your surgery code and length of planned stay. You may then decide to book a time immediately if you are not waiting for authorisation from another body. If you are waiting for authorisation first from an insurer, then we will confirm a date once you have got this. It is very important that you do not book surgery until you are 100% sure that you will be coming.

 

Once a booking has been made then the hospital will contact you 1-2 weeks pre surgery to arrange details regarding hospital payments and preassessment. You’ll need to be in the area of the hospital by lunchtime the day before surgery for an anaesthetic pre-assessment (included in the package price fee). The pre-assessment nurse will contact you to arrange this a week or so before surgery and this should not stop you booking your travel earlier so long as you have arranged to be available the afternoon of the day before surgery in the hospital. You will also receive surgical and anaesthetic invoices separately to be paid before admission for surgery. Surgical fees are always paid any bank transfer but other fees have multiple payment options.

 

Both myself and Dr Dhond, my anaesthetist, will see you on the ward to complete the consent form and talk through things before you come down to the operating theatre.

 

On the day following surgery we try to spend time going through an unedited recording of your surgery as this is worth much more than words. We will give you a USB stick copy to take home for your records.

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We have a urology clinical nurse specialist to whom we refer patients who have difficulty passing urine after surgery, which is a specific risk after endometriosis surgery. These patients may need to initially leave the hospital with a catheter before returning to remove it in a special nurse-led outpatient clinic, and may need to be taught how to catheterise themselves intermittently whilst bladder function returns. These services are charged separately.

 

There are 3 main components to the organisation:

 

Hospital fee and admin

 

If you are a self-pay patient on a self-pay price package, as most of our patients are, then the hospital will contact you about paying the hospital fee directly to them, often by bank transfer, about a week or so before surgery. If the actual operation we carry out is different in some way to what we had initially thought, and usually we would warn you of this if it’s a possibility, then you may be eligible for a refund, or may need to pay a surcharge. This can take several weeks to sort out after the surgery once the main finance office gets the full details of your patient episode.

 

The package price fee is inclusive of pre-assessment including tests, hospital operation costs, ward stay, including food and drugs etc… usually for a one or two-night stay depending if your surgery is simple or complex.

 

Also included are the drugs to take home up to a value of £100 and the assessment of the specimens we send to the lab from the operation. Additional nights are £1352 per night. You should plan to stay in the UK around 3-5 days for straightforward surgery or 5-7 days for complex surgery if you can and we can advise you roughly before and again after surgery what this should be. This is due to the possibility of delayed major complications that can occur in the first couple of weeks after surgery.

 

If you did get a major complication then this would be costed separately and could again be very expensive in private care, running into thousands of pounds, but the risk is low. You do need to be aware of and accept this though.

 

Surgical fee

 

This will be sent to you by email invoice about a week before surgery for you to settle by bank transfer before admission.

 

Anaesthetic fee

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The anaesthetic office of Dr Dhond (GAS UK) will invoice you before surgery and you settle this invoice with them directly before admission.

 

If you are returning to your own country, then we recommend booking flexible flights in case you need to change them for the return. Also good to book wheelchair assistance to the flight gate on the return trip in case you’re having trouble walking a long way. There are many hotels in the vicinity of the hospital to choose from or many women choose an Air B&B type accommodation for the post-operative period.