NALED Healthcare Alliance held a constitutive session chaired by Vukašin Radulović, co-founder of the company “Heliant”. The session was attended as guests by the Minister of Health, Danica Grujičić, and the director of the IT Department at the National Health Insurance Fund (RFZO), Marko Jovanović.
They discussed the priorities of the Healthcare Alliance and the next steps in the digitization of the healthcare system, such as the introduction of a single electronic health record and the connection of all institutions and specialist physicians through electronic referral form and electronic medical files, as well as facilitating patient access to specialist physicians, reports the portal naled.rs.
As stated in the announcement from the session of this working body of the NALED organization, the establishment of an electronic file will be one of the key reform priorities of the Healthcare Alliance, which will provide support to the Ministry of Health and competent institutions in this project.
Access to these records should also be given to physicians in private facilities, in order to provide more effective treatment.
In the next two years, the work of the Healthcare Alliance will be focused on reducing waiting times and increasing the number of services that citizens will be able to undergo in private healthcare facilities at the expense of the RFZO (now this is the case with dialysis, in vitro fertilization, hyperbaric chamber and cataract surgeries).
Further work will be performed on the digitization of procedures, primarily when it comes to clinical studies and obtaining drug licenses, so that new, modern and more effective treatments are available to our citizens.
The newly elected Chairman of the Healthcare Alliance, Vukašin Radulović, announced that this body would support the implementation of the Digitization Program in the healthcare system in the part that plans the launch of the eSick-leave service.
“Our goal, among other things, is for physicians in the private sector to get the opportunity to approve sick leave for patients. Also, our focus is the launch of the e-Referral service, which we want to enable specialist physicians to issue referral forms for further treatment, which would spare citizens from scheduling appointment with their chosen physician to get a referral form. And finally, the goal is to extend the ePrescription service, which applies to drugs from the A list, also to B, C and D list drugs,” said Radulović.
Minister Danica Grujičić pointed out that Serbian healthcare needs digitization so that physicians can devote all their energy to treating patients, and not spend valuable time on administrative tasks.
“The project of the Ministry of Health on the family physician is, in fact, the idea that through greater support for family physicians – which are the physicians in the “most local” community – we can achieve primary healthcare that, through preventive action, achieves a higher level of healthcare for the entire nation,” Grujičić emphasized.
“RFZO launched the SAP information system and thus established inspection into the goods and material condition of healthcare facilities in order to optimize spending and create large financial savings,” said Marko Jovanović, director of the IT Department at RFZO.
It was also agreed that in the next month, the Alliance would present to the Ministry an analysis and recommendations for improving the procedure of placing the medicine on the market, which lasted two to three years instead of nine months, which made it difficult for citizens to access medicines.
Emphasis will also be placed on simplifying clinical trials of drugs on humans, because this procedure, which means a lot to severely ill patients means to have an innovative drug that will not be on the market for some time available for treatment and it also benefits physicians to get to know new treatment methods. This procedure in Serbia takes up to three times longer than in other countries and deters companies from investing in clinical trials in our country.
The publication of the second edition of the “Grey Book of Health”, which contains a list of the 50 biggest administrative obstacles to the development of this sector, as well as specific solutions to overcome them, is expected in the coming year.
Healthcare Alliance New Management
In the next two years, this Healthcare Alliance will be chaired by Vukašin Radulović. Una Ljubičić, Head of Rare Diseases Department at “Pfizer”, Vladimir Tipsarević, Director of Public Policy and Public Relations at “Novo Nordisk Pharma”, Dejan Pešić, Director of “MediGroup” were elected vice-chairpersons. Lidija Dimitrijević, deputy mayor of Leskovac, will participate in the work of the Alliance from the level of local government authorities.
