NHIF Comprehensive and Non-comprehensive Cover

While NHIF provides a comprehensive health cover called ‘Supa Cover‘ to all its members, the benefits a member can get from it depend ultimately on their choice of hospital.

Until recently, NHIF accredited hospitals contracted to provide inpatient services to its members were categorized into three categories i.e A, B and C. These categories have since been updated into two, namely: comprehensive and non-comprehensive.

This change makes the categories much easier to interpret as the meaning is in the words themselves. Let’s take a look at both.

Comprehensive vs Non-Comprehensive Hospitals

As the name suggests, hospitals in the comprehensive category are contracted to provide a comprehensive inpatient cover to NHIF members. This means that the members will not pay out of pocket for any inpatient services when admitted in hospitals in this category.

This category includes all public hospitals and some select faith-based (mission) and private hospitals.

As for hospitals in the non-comprehensive category, NHIF may not cover for all inpatient services. NHIF members that use these hospitals may therefore be expected to pay out of pocket for some inpatient services. Usually this involves a co-payment, whereby NHIF covers the cost of specified services (e.g. bed charges) and the member covers the rest out of pocket (e.g. surgery)

Unless it’s an emergency, it’s therefore vital that members know the category a hospital belongs to before seeking any inpatient services from it, as this may save them expensive hospital bills.

To check the category a hospital belongs to, head over to the inpatient hospital listing on the NHIF website and search for your preferred facility.