President Milanović Receives Croatian Medical Chamber Delegation

The President of the Republic Zoran Milanović received a delegation of the Croatian Medical Chamber consisting of Assembly president Asst Prof Krešimir Dolić, PhD, Council president Prof. Goran Hauser, PhD, Chamber president Krešimir Luetić, PhD, first vice president Vikica Krolo, MD, second vice president Ivana Šmit, MD, member of the Executive Board and president of the Department for International Affairs Dr. Ivan Raguž, and the Chamber’s head of Administration Ivan Bojčić.

They discussed the status of physicians in Croatia and the problems that the medical profession encounters. The Chamber president noted the problem of the Croatian Medical Chamber union’s representation in the collective bargaining process as well as the impossibility of directly negotiating working rights and obligations, which is a result of the current legislative framework.

Furthermore, the Chamber delegation informed President Milanović of a process that is under way for drafting and adopting a law on physician salaries or a professional collective agreement for physicians which would define the work, the status and the position of physicians. The bottom line is to keep physicians in the Republic of Croatia and maintain the Croatian healthcare system. They indicated that the main problem concerns overtime hours, i.e. a salary system solely regulated through on call duty. They feel that a possible solution to this problem is increasing the physicians’ base salary.

Another problem encountered by the healthcare system is the emigration of young or retired physicians, which has a direct impact on the provision of healthcare to citizens. Consequently, they cautioned that the issue of the system’s sustainability in terms of staff is uncertain, underlining a decreasing number of family physicians. According to Croatian Medical Chamber data, in Croatia today there are 2,200 family physicians with some 600 of them to retire in the coming years.

PHOTO: Office of the President of the Republic of Croatia / Filip Glas