Abstract
Polish medical device legislation was amended in 2004. The prospect of EU
accession prompted the Polish authorities to make legislation compliant with
EU requirements. This report is ideal for executives wanting to understand the
key drivers in the medical market and have access to a wealth of statistical
data, including five-year market projections. Included with the report are 3
free quarterly updated outlook reports, enabling you to keep up to date with
market developments for a year.
The Polish healthcare system has been subject to many structural changes over
the last decade. The government has continuously struggled to provide a 'free'
high quality health service, due to a shortage of funds. The health insurance
system was reformed in the late 1990s, causing confusion and the serious
disruption to services. Further reforms in 2003 eliminated some problems, such
as regional differentials in the cost of treatment, but improvements to the
quality of the health service have been slow due to financial difficulties.
The salaries of medical staff remain low and the government is having to deal
with the problem of specialised personnel leaving the country in search of
better working conditions. Funding problems are expected to continue in the
future, as the healthcare contribution rate will rise for the last time in
2007, to 9.0% of earnings. This is likely to increase the volume of
under-the-table payments, which is already high.
In order to tackle the funding issue, a minority of politicians are currently
discussing the unpopular concept of introducing patients co-payments. This
move has little support from the governing PiS and Self-Defence parties
however, and the proposal is not expected to be passed by the Sejm. Healthcare
has always been a heavily debated and politically sensitive issue. The current
government has loosely considered scrapping the health insurance system and
moving the responsibilty of funding healthcare to national and local
government, but talks have not begun on the restructuring of duties.
Polish medical device legislation was amended in 2004. The prospect of EU
accession prompted the Polish authorities to make legislation compliant with
EU requirements. EU entry has affected the uptake of treatment in Poland.
Polish citizens are able to travel more freely within the EU, providing them
with better access to overseas treatment (on the condition that they have
obtained authorisation from the National Health Fund to receive free treatment
abroad). EU citizens also experience fewer problems in travelling to Poland
for private medical treatment, which is cheaper than that available in western
European countries. Treatment costs are financed by the insurance company that
the patient is registered with in their home country.
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