Deputy Minister Marek Kos on automatic reimbursement

We read in the health ministry's response to a letter from the Healthcare Employers' Alliance, who have repeatedly drawn attention to the need to urgently sort out unclear and ambiguous reimbursement regulations, resulting in unfair penalties for doctors and depriving patients of the opportunity to take advantage of their due concessions.

- The reimbursement mess includes the fact that one drug can have up to five different reimbursement levels. It's hard to keep up with it! It is often very difficult for us doctors, who care about patients' health, to determine which benefits patients are entitled to and which are not. Only clear reimbursement rules will allow us to treat with peace of mind. Automation would dispel any doubts about prescribing medicines to patients entitled to reimbursement," wrote PPOZ president Bożena Janicka in a recent letter to the Minister of Health.

In an October 4 response, Deputy Health Minister Marek Kos said that the Health Ministry, in conjunction with the e-Health Center and others, had already begun work on a system for automatically determining the level of reimbursement for drugs, foodstuffs for special nutritional purposes and medical devices since April. Substantive verification of the collected data is currently underway, but due to the enormity of the material, it is difficult to estimate when the work will be completed.

- We are looking forward to implementing these changes, which will take the responsibility of prescribing reimbursement drugs off the hands of doctors, and provide patients with clarity and understandable rules! It's high time! - Bozena Janicka emphasizes.

Source: PPOZ