Doctor and former director of Srebrnjak Boro Nogalo said that he was extremely disappointed with the announced healthcare reform.
“It’s all nicely wrapped in cellophane, but I don’t see deadlines there. I am extremely disappointed with the reform itself and all the indicators listed in it. From the position of a patient – I’m retiring tomorrow – I want to have better healthcare, but I don’t have that feeling. We have a feeling that only people with good connections, contacts, money can solve their problems. There is a situation where you cannot solve anything completely in the public system. In order to solve something in a short period of time, you have to pay in the private sector”, criticized Nogalo.
To reporter Ivana Tomić’s remark that it sounds terrible when a doctor says that it is impossible to do without a bandage, Nogalo repeats:
“You can’t do otherwise.”
He also said that he is fighting for public and private healthcare to compete, so that in such a situation the patient is given the choice.
“But what happens is that people in public health work to fill their private clinics. This is unacceptable, I cannot accept it. And this is what 70 percent of people from Slavonia, Banovina, Lika cannot afford to solve their problem efficiently. He can only solve it with connections or money”, said Nogalo.
He agrees that the announcement of the introduction of mandatory systematic reviews means transferring them to private individuals.
“How can a head, head develop his system, and at the same time send patients to his private polyclinics. You cannot run a public health system and have your own polyclinic. Then be an ordinary doctor, do your work that you will refer to your boss, and then you can work in the afternoon. Such work organizers do not organize work well, so they channel patients privately”, said Nogalo, adding that he agrees that they should have competition in the form of the private sector.
He cites the fact that all bosses are chosen along political and clientelistic lines as the worst problem, and he considers the centralization of the system extremely bad.
“Centralization is a disaster. The system was very messed up. Certain regions had hospitals, they worked at minuses, they devastated everything together and then the state paid for it. Now it’s being handled in an even worse way. The system needs to be decentralized at every level, and today we are going for centralization, a worse system than it was in Yugoslavia”, said Nogalo.
He also touched on the story surrounding the investment in the children’s hospital, which ultimately left him without the position of director of the hospital.
“We fought for that children’s hospital for 12 years. The account of the Ministry of Science has HRK 432 million to invest in the most modern hospital in Srebrenjak, and what is happening? Nothing. Then we have pledges for the National Children’s Hospital. I support it, but you have a procedure of 7 to 10 years. Tomorrow we can have a modern children’s hospital, and no one talks about it,” he said.
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