The new medical insurance package

The Romanian medical system will see significant changes next year. The health ministry on Sunday submitted to public debate the final version of the new basic and minimum medical services packages due to be introduced next March. The draft provides for the shift from hospital to pre-hospital medicine and a focus on the prevention and early diagnosis of disorders, so that hospitals no longer have to provide unnecessary services, the health minister Eugen Nicolaescu has explained. He also spoke about the type of patients who will benefit from priority care:

Leyla Cheamil, 23.12.2013, 12:25

“The minimum medical services package available to uninsured people contains emergency medical care, prevention services provided by the family doctor, and family planning services. Special attention will be given to pregnant women and women who have recently given birth who will benefit from consultation and monitoring from their family doctors and out-patient specialist care. All women in Romania, whether they have medical insurance or not, will benefit from medical assistance during child birth.”

People aged between 18 and 39 who do not show symptoms of disease will benefit from prevention consultation once every three years, as well as a set of tests if required. For people over 40, the prevention consultation may also contain 1 or 2 visits to the doctor and a set of further tests.

Multidisciplinary out-patient consultations will be introduced, so that patients with complex disorders may be assessed by different teams of specialist physicians. According to the health minister, this type of consultations includes a wide range of lab tests, as well as new tests to discover autoimmune and endocrinological disorders.

The minister expects the effects of the new healthcare package to become visible in 2 or 3 years’ time. One year after the introduction of the new package, between 5 and 10% of the people benefiting from inpatient care today will benefit from outpatient treatment, but this figure will rise to 30 to 40%. He pointed out that all patients, whether they have health insurance or not, will have access to the 21 national health programmes coordinated by a special agency recently created to this end.

The new list of subsidised medicine has also been finalised. It contains 130 new drugs and will be introduced in March 2014.