Czech healthcare insurers promise patients enough money for treatment

2009-12-08

Ladislav Friedrich, the President of the Health Insurance Companies Association, has assured Czech patients that treatment waiting periods will not be extended and doctors will not be prescribing fewer medicines to patients, even though due to the crisis the income from obligatory health insurance premiums is indeed lower than expected, Czech news agency CTK reported.
This came as response to the voices of the Czech Chamber of Healthcare Professionals (CLK) and the Association of Bohemian and Moravian Hospitals, which have been sounding alarm bells that health insurance companies will reduce the amount of financial resources available for healthcare services and, as a result, patients’ access to quality healthcare will be severely limited in 2010.
The Czech Ministry of Health has been updating the country’s Reimbursement Ordinance that sets reimbursement limits for treatment covered from the obligatory health insurance. The Chamber fears that the limits will not be high enough, which will force doctors to deny treatment to some patients. Deputy Health Minister Marek Snajdr said, however, that next year the money available to doctors and hospitals to provide their services will be at the same level as this year, which means that they will be able to treat the same amount of patients without having to lower the quality of their services.