Pirkanmaa: Tens of Thousands Miss Appointments, Patients Billed €73.70

Tens of thousands of outpatient appointments in Pirkanmaa went unused last year, and patients are being billed €73.70 for missed visits, Aamulehti reported.

More than 35,000 missed visits occurred at Tampere University Hospital (Tays) and other hospital services alone. Pirha sends roughly 12,500 of the €73.70 invoices to adults each year.

Nearly 9,000 dental appointments went unused, and about 9,000 psychiatric appointments were missed.

Chief physicians Olli Leppänen and Jukka Karjalainen said forgetfulness was the most common reason. Other factors included transport problems, substance use, mental health challenges, incorrect contact details and limited digital skills.

No-shows account for about 4% of hospital visits. That included more than 21,000 follow-up appointments and nearly 1,000 inpatient procedures that were not attended.

Pirha acknowledges the statistics undercount actual no-shows in open care. The new patient record system will allow two reminder messages and, for some bookings, direct electronic cancellation, although some appointments cannot be cancelled digitally because they require special preparations or are part of multi-visit treatments.

The problem comes amid rising requests for fee relief from Pirha and longer wait times for relief decisions as charges rose. More than 1,000 residents are waiting for decisions on relief applications while the backlog grew.