MedLife, one of the main private medical services providers on the Romanian market has inaugurated today, in the presence of Mr. Guy Ellena, IFC Director for Health and Education, the largest private hospital in Romania: Life Memorial Hospital, said the company in a statement.
MedLife has invested about 10 million euros in the construction and equipment of Life Memorial Hospital and benefited from consultancy for the design and business strategy of the hospital provided by International Finance Corporation (IFC). „We are confident that this first private hospital which meets European standards and is part of the network we are going to develop in the following years will stand out on the market of private health services. A first step in this regard is the support provided by IFC, who chose to stand by us, becoming one of MedLife’s shareholders in October last year, following a thorough assessment of the quality of the services and management of our business”, stated Mihail Marcu, President of MedLife. „Life Memorial Hospital is different as it concentrates all medical services in one location – ambulatory, laboratory and surgery services, due to the state-of-the-art medical equipment for all specialities, as well as to the high quality and comfort standards provided to the patients: excellent accommodation, rooms equipped with laptops and free internet and email access, recovery and relaxation facilities etc.” added Mihail Marcu.
Located at 365 Calea Grivitei, district 1 (in the northern part of Bucharest), Life Memorial Hospital has a surface of 10.000 sqm, out of which the surgery unit of the hospital represents 1.400 mp. It comprises five surgery rooms and intensive care units, as well as a separate maternity ward with neonatology section. The hospital has 100 beds grouped in wards with one or two beds and apartments, wards for internal diseases, paediatrics and a centre for mobility rehabilitation and balneal therapy. Thus, MedLife will provide hospital services for a wide range of medical specialities: general surgery, plastic surgery, ophthalmology, dermatology, gynaecology and maternal services, paediatrics and neonatology, oncology etc.
The hospital benefits from an ambulatory section and its own test laboratory, which facilitates the performance of medical investigations and setting the diagnosis in a short time. The ambulatory section includes 40 medical units with the necessary imagery (CAT scan, radiology, mammography, ultrasound, bone density measurements) with state-of-the-art medical equipment. The test laboratory is the only private one in the country, which in addition to the common specialities – biochemistry, haematology, immunology and bacteriology, integrates laboratories of pathological anatomy and genetics.
Private health insurance in order to benefit from the services of Life Memorial Hospital. The access to the services provided by Life Memorial Hospital will be possible both for the clients insured by AsiLife – MedLife’s own insurance division – as well as for paying customers. By mid-february, MedLife will launch five private health insurance packages, which, in a first stage, will be addressed only to corporate clients (companies which provide subscriptions to their employers) and will vary between 15 and 100 euro/month, depending on the complexity of the services included.
For he end of May 2007, MedLife is also preparing two private health insurance products for individuals, with standard prices of 100 and 200 euros/month. For surgical interventions, in general surgery, Life Memorial Hospital will charge approximately 10-20% smaller fees than its competition, whereas for plastic surgery interventions the fees will be 30% lower. As for the accommodation fees, the hospitalisation day will amount to about 50 euro in a double ward and approximately 100 euro in a single ward.
By the end of 2008, MedLife will operate 5 private hospitals in the country and one in Bucharest. Life Memorial Hospital is the first hospital in the network of private hospitals that MedLife will develop in the following years. According to the financing partnership signed with IFC in October 2006, MedLife will build private clinics and hospitals with 40-50 beds each in five cities: Constanta, Timisoara, Brasov, Iasi and Cluj-Napoca. The total value of the investment, in the Memorial Hospitals and the MedLife Hyperclinics across the country amounts to 25 million USD, without including the equipment they will be endowed with.
MedLife has about 80.000 subscribers, from over 900 companies and has registered a turnover of 26.5 million RON (about 7.5 million euros) in 2006. MedLife owns a 25% market share in Bucharest for one of the largest market segments, the services provided to corporate clients.
Starting October 2006, IFC is a shareholder of MedLife, owning 20% of shares. MedLife operates 19 clinics, including one in Ploiesti, Brasov and Constanta, and 16 in Bucharest and has over 350 employees, out of which about 200 are physicians and nurses. In the country, MedLife provides to its customers the same health services through the 94 partner clinics and medical centres from the NetLife network. MedLife is certified ISO 9001 and holds ISO 17025 for each of the company’s three test laboratories.
