Although it was announced at the session of the previous government in July that from January 2024, dental offices will start working again in schools, less than a month before the new year, the adaptation of the premises has not even started.
At the end of October, the Directorate for Capital Projects announced a tender for the adaptation of dental clinics in 59 schools, but it was canceled because there were no interested bidders who would do the work for 880.000 euros.
The return of dentists to schools and health centers is announced from the middle of 2021, and the opening of clinics is first planned for 2022, then for the beginning of the school year in September 2023, and then for January 2024.
In the capital budget proposal for the year 2024, half a million is once again foreseen for this project, of which 481.000 euros refer to construction facilities, i.e. works.
The state approached the reform frivolously
Since 2009, the Montenegrin Institute for Public Health has had no record of the number of dental services provided to children, since they were transferred to the private sector through the reform.
The Parents' Association says that two and a half years ago, they were happy when they heard that dentists were returning to schools.
"However, it turned out that the state did not seriously work on it, nor was it planned how the reform would be approached, nor were realistic deadlines planned," said Lepa Žunjić from the Parents Association.
She said that one could not get the impression that the project whose goal is to return dentists to schools and health centers was approached seriously.
"The Health Insurance Fund also warned that the deadlines are unrealistic. This has been talked about for two years, and now they have come to a situation where the tender for the adaptation of the premises has been cancelled. The competent authorities must sit down with representatives of the Dental Chamber and dentists, to agree on whether someone will want to work in schools," Žunjić pointed out.
In August 2021, the Ministry of Health formed a working group to ensure the conditions for the reopening of dental clinics in primary and secondary schools. The group consisted of representatives of the then Ministries of Health, Education, Science, Culture and Sports, the Ministry of Finance and Social Welfare, the Health Insurance Fund and the Podgorica Health Center. The Fund has also formed a working group to develop an analysis on the fulfillment of the conditions for opening clinics in schools. The analysis was completed in February 2022 and showed that at the given moment, there are 59 schools with realistic conditions for opening clinics.
It is planned to work in two shifts in 11 schools, which means that it would be necessary to form 70 teams consisting of a dentist and a nurse.
It is not known who will work in the clinics
To this day, it is not known who will work in dental clinics in schools. The Association of Parents says that it was promised that the existing system of contracts with private clinics, where children and other categories of the population are referred, at the expense of the budget, will remain in force.
This can be seen from the budget proposal for the next year, according to which six million euros are planned for dental services.
The previous Minister of Health, Dragoslav Šćekić, said in July of this year that "the money that is now allocated for private surgeries will be directed to public health, and that specializations in children's dentistry will also be financed from it."
The planned reform of dental health care, which would initially return outpatient clinics to only 59 out of 300 schools, was not acceptable to the Dental Chamber, and the members of the Association of Preventive and Pediatric Dentists did not agree with the proposed model either.
Five months ago, the Dental Chamber said that they support the idea of returning dentists to health centers in order to improve preventive dental health care, but that without an assessment of the state of oral health, which is the basis for planning the development and improvement of that area, the fear remains that just another experiment with that activity in Montenegro.
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