PhilHealth expands benefits for people with disabilities

MANILA, Philippines – The Philippine Health Insurance Corp. (PhilHealth) will expand its Z Benefits for the prosthesis and rehabilitation package for persons with disabilities (PWDs).

PhilHealth president and chief executive officer Alexander Padilla said the current coverage of P15,000 per lower limb is enough, based on their assessment of the Z MORPH or mobility, orthosis, rehabilitation, prosthesis and prosthesis help program and a series of consultative meetings and dialogues with stakeholders.

“However, there are still some services that need to be included such as physical therapy, other levels of amputation, and orthoses, thus, we are expanding the package now,” he noted.

Introduced barely five years ago, the Z MORPH is a special benefit for the fitting of upper limb prostheses, orthoses and orthoprostheses.

Padilla added that the expansion of the package is in support of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and Rights of the Child wherein 21 countries, including the Philippines, are signatories to the APEC Global Friends of Disability. 

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), PWDs have the same general health care needs as others, but they are twice as likely to find health care providers’ skills and facilities inadequate.

PWDs are also three times as likely to be denied health care as the general population, and twice as likely to suffer catastrophic health expenditures. 

“We recognize the full and equal enjoyment of human rights by persons with disabilities, hence PhilHealth shall ensure protection of their inherent dignity through prosthetic, orthotic and orthoprosthetic devices that are safe, available and of the right quality,” Padilla said. 

The expanded Z MORPH package rate for above knee/knee disarticulation prostheses is now P95,000, while coverage for hip disarticulation prostheses is P180,000.