‘We Expect Changes in Hospital Operations from Autumn’

We expect changes in the healthcare system from autumn. Among other things, in the operations of hospitals. The starting point for the system change will be a study conducted by a French agency. For 200 thousand euros from a World Bank loan and with co-financing from the state – said Rajko Ostojić in the HRT News.

-It is clear to everyone that Croatia does not need 64 hospitals and departments that are half-filled. But what the French will propose, the Ministry does not reveal. They only say that the master plan will analyze the state of the hospital system and propose concrete measures for restructuring and reorganization at the level of individual institutions – he added.

Health Minister Rajko Ostojić, guesting on the News, said that hospitals had only been sinecures. We will not close hospitals, but we will close some departments; there will be significant restructuring within them, the minister confirmed.

Prof. Dr. Ante Ćorušić, president of the HDZ Health Committee, believes that the minister should have sought domestic expertise. He says it would have been better if we had jointly developed a Strategy for the Development of Croatian Healthcare because it is a national interest. This cannot be party demagoguery and only a party decision. The HDZ offers a solution. The establishment of a National Health Service that would align regional needs. This National Service would be clustered – a cluster of medical professionals, a procurement cluster, an IT technical service cluster, a maintenance cluster, Ćorušić stated. This would avoid overlapping staff and unnecessary costs. Perhaps this is the way for the minister to also address the issue of sinecures, which is among the reasons he initiated healthcare reform.

The president of the Croatian Association for the Promotion of Patient Rights, Đula Rušinović-Sunara, reacted to announcements from HZZO about a new way of sending patients for specialist examinations, hospitalization, diagnostic tests, and outpatient treatment. She emphasizes that for more than 20 years, mostly unsuccessful healthcare reforms have been implemented in Croatia and adds that the decision coming into effect in about ten days was made on the recommendation of foreign consultants.

In an interview for the News, Minister Ostojić, speaking about changes whereby family doctors will perform all preoperative procedures, said that this returns dignity to primary care physicians. This is their reform, he asserted.

When asked whether doctors would have to prescribe the cheapest medications, the minister said that this has been misinterpreted. It is not about the cheapest medications, but about medications with the same chemical composition, differing in price. In that case, the medication of the most favorable manufacturer is prescribed, the minister said.

When asked whether higher co-payments and fees for health insurance could be expected in autumn, he replied that they are not thinking about that for now. A few months ago, we reduced the price of the point and thus the price of services and consequently the co-payment. In other words, in the last six months, our citizens have been paying a lower co-payment in absolute terms because the price of healthcare services has been lowered, and thus the co-payment, he emphasized.

He denied reports that Jaga Stojić was reinstated after a bishop’s appeal. An inspection from the Ministry was sent to the hospital in Knin, which pointed out a number of irregularities and illogicalities, and based on that, Jaga Stojić was reinstated, the minister said.