Department of Health(DOH)

Hi! I would like to inquire about the validity of a guarantee letter for hospital medical assistance. In October 2024, we were generously given a guarantee letter from Tingog. Our deepest gratitude goes to Speaker Romualdez and the representatives of Tingog for their assistance. My sister’s hard work as a government employee in Region 8 has not gone in vain. My sister was diagnosed with Stage 3 colon cancer and has to undergo chemotherapy. We were financially drained after a series of medications, 28 days in the hospital, and ongoing treatments. This is why we sought financial assistance from the government. We chose to have the chemotherapy at Perpetual Succour Hospital in Cebu City since my sister’s oncologist is affiliated with the same hospital. Last year, we were informed that a guarantee letter is valid for three months from the time of issuance. However, once used, any remaining balance cannot be utilized as the hospital must bill the amount to the DOH immediately. Fortunately, we were able to use some guarantee letters for two hospital visits because they were only a week apart and had not yet been billed to the DOH. However, in many instances, the guarantee letters were not fully utilized because we were advised that they had already been billed to the DOH. For example, our guarantee letter from Tingog in October 2024 was not fully used because it was billed to the DOH just two weeks after it was initially used for chemotherapy. This raises my concern: does this align with DOH guidelines? Is the hospital legally allowed to prevent a patient from using the full amount of the guarantee letter based on its own timeframe (1–2 weeks, in our case)? Their policy states that only one guarantee letter can be used per session or hospital visit, but my understanding is that a guarantee letter remains valid until the last day of the year. Additionally, we were informed that there was a cut-off for accepting guarantee letters in December 2024. We were told that December 13 was the deadline for billing to the DOH, so we were unable to utilize our guarantee letter since our visit was on December 16. This year, we received a new guarantee letter from Ako Bisaya, and we were told that a new DOH guideline states that the validity period is now just one month from issuance. According to the hospital’s index card, the validity is indeed set for only one month. I also had to pay ₱50 for the index card. However, after searching online, I could not find any new memorandum regarding guarantee letters in 2025. The last relevant memorandum I found was from 2023. I am raising this FOI request to seek clarification on the official DOH guidelines regarding guarantee letters. I am happy to abide by the hospital’s policies as long as they align with national government regulations. Thank you for your time and assistance. I look forward to your response. Best regards, Juju