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Bulgarian Minister Stefan Konstantinov declared he will introduce new rules in hospitals. Photo by BGNES
It is crucial that clear rules concerning payment and treatment be established in all hospitals, according to the newly appointed Bulgarian Health Minister.
"A BGN 950 maximum should be introduced for the "equip choice" procedure", Minister Konstantinov stated Friday on private Bulgarian channel BTV, thus hoping to terminate the practice of hospitals blackmailing patients to pay as much as BGN 10 000.
Minister Konstantinov referred to the controversial "equip choice" practice, which is broadly accepted in Bulgarian hospitals. The essence of this mechanism is to provide the patients with the right to choose which of the hospital's doctors and medical teams suits best their needs.
The "equip choice" was introduced in order to eliminate corruption, which usually takes the form of informal "alms-giving" in Bulgarian hospitals. However, this practice has also raised serious suspicions, as it turns out that patients are often being forced to choose a certain specialist and pay an unreasonably high amount of money in exchange.
Diagnosis related groups will be introduced next year in order to replace the so called clinical paths in Bulgaria (access to various medical services), Minister Konstantinov also announced.
The Diagnosis-related group (DRG) system will be used to classify hospital cases into groups, which are expected to have similar hospital resource use.
Stefan Konstantinov is the third consecutive Health Minister the Bulgarian centrist GERB government has appointed in just over a year. He was deputy chairman of the Managing Board of the Bulgarian Doctors' Union and took over the new position in October, vowing to finally reform the suffering Bulgarian health care system.
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