Treatment and diagnostics of our citizens abroad last year cost around 14,3 million euros, and around 80 percent of patients were referred to neighboring Serbia.
This is shown by statistics from the Health Insurance Fund (FZO), submitted upon request to "Vijesti".
"The total costs of treatment and diagnostics abroad for Montenegrin insured persons in 2024 amounted to 14.287.986,77 euros," said the institution it manages. Vuk Kadic.
The Health Insurance Fund points out that last year the institution approved 3.795 referrals for treatment, control and diagnostics.
Most patients, they explain, were referred for treatment - 2.889 insured people, 779 had to travel abroad for diagnostics, while 530 went for a check-up.
Insured persons are referred for treatment in health institutions outside Montenegro for conditions and diseases that cannot be successfully treated or diagnosed in our health institutions, and there is a possibility of treatment using the most complex scientifically recognized methods that have been confirmed in medical practice.
572 children referred for early diagnosis and treatment in Serbia
The Health Insurance Fund points out that out of a total of 3.795 referrals, the majority were approved for healthcare institutions in the Republic of Serbia - 2.889. They say that 637 patients were referred to Turkey.
Looking at the health institutions, the most referrals were made to the Institute for Experimental Phonetics and Speech Pathology in Belgrade, where 572 children were referred.
This Institute, in accordance with the contract with the Health Insurance Fund, refers children up to the age of 18 with speech, language, hearing, behavioral and learning disorders, for the purpose of providing early diagnostic services and audiolinguistic treatments.
Statistics from the Health Insurance Fund show that 464 patients were referred to the Clinical Center of Serbia. The Health Insurance Fund says that 386 insured patients were referred to the University Children's Clinic in Belgrade.
Last year, 379 people were referred to the Turkish Acibadem clinic, 258 to Memorial-Istanbul, and 245 to the Banjica Institute for Orthopedic and Surgical Diseases in Belgrade.
Still the only one without a PET scanner
The largest number of insured people from Montenegro are still referred to Turkey, most often for PET/CT diagnostics. Oncology patients are most often sent for this type of diagnostics, several hundred annually, and Montenegro is still the only country in the region that does not have a PET scanner, unlike Serbia, Republika Srpska, Macedonia, and Albania.
Authorities previously announced that a PET scanner, the gold standard for diagnosing patients with tumors, will be installed at the Clinical Center of Montenegro (KCCG) by the end of 2023.
This institution is implementing the project "Improving the Diagnosis and Treatment of Cancer Patients with PET/CT Systems", the second phase of which, for 2024 and 2025, envisages the installation of equipment and the start of work, as well as possible additional expert assistance, which they would seek to provide in cooperation with the International Atomic Energy Agency.
Sometimes it's more practical to send abroad
Commenting on the costs of treatment abroad, the Director of the Health Insurance Fund, Vuk Kadić, said that Montenegro, as a small system, cannot develop all branches of medicine and that in a certain number of cases it is more practical to send patients to specialized centers abroad.
"We must be aware that we are a small country and that medicine is largely based on experience gained only from a large number of cases, so it is not realistic to develop some rare procedures here because even much larger and richer countries are not able to do so," Kadić said earlier. Recently, during a discussion on the budget for next year, he said that we cannot condition the prices of services in other countries if we intend to provide our citizens with the best health care and treatment, and that a budget of seven or eight million is no longer sufficient for this purpose.
For comparison, in 2018, 3.842 insured persons were referred for treatment abroad, which is approximately the same level as in 2024, and they cost around 7,5 million euros. In 2019, there were around 3.000 referrals in total, and the costs amounted to 8,9 million.
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