Healthcare losses need thorough analysis

Hospital losses have become a recurring fact in Slovenia’s healthcare system, but they need to be examined rather than repeatedly covered. Irena Žagar, a patient rights representative, says the state is only putting out fires by providing extra money for selected services and paying losses before the same problem returns the following year.

Žagar, a lawyer and former Supreme Court judge who chairs the Srebrna nit association, also raises concern about the frequent replacement of directors, especially at large public healthcare institutions. In her view, each change creates additional disruption.

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The state is only putting out fires, allocating additional funds for certain services and covering the losses, and the same thing happens again the following year.

“Directors should be experts in organization and management, not appointed on the basis of political decisions, sometimes even without sufficient experience,” she says.

She argues that a thorough analysis should identify what causes the losses. The system lacks clear norms, she says, and its standards remain too loose. Public institutions and concessionaires also operate from unequal positions, because public providers must accept every patient.

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Directors should be experts in organization and management, not appointed on the basis of political decisions, sometimes even without sufficient experience.