Victories of the past and possibilities of the future for Estonia’s patients

Patient-organizaions, politicians, doctors officials and policy makers, analysts gathered on 18th of November to discuss the possibility of patient centered healthcare in Estonia.

Taking into account the decreased financing in healthcare, experts discussed, what could be the priorities in the upcoming years for patients and what kind of choices our society should prepare itself for.

The changed perspective of financing is in a contradiction with the expectations set by our society. PRAXIS foresaw that already in 2005, but the recent financial crisis has brought the turning point nearer. Therefore it is already in few years difficult or even impossible to continue the same way.

The policy analysis written by our health program´s analysts Ain Aaviksoo, Janek Saluse and Gerli Paat, describes the benefits offered to patients in the period of fast economic growth and challenges that we will be facing in the upcoming years. According to Ain Aaviksoo the public debate in Estonia seems to be more concerned with salaries of healthcare personnel, location of hospital buildings and spending on healthcare, whereas in more developed countries the key issue of the 21.century in healthcare is centered around results and values, that the healthcare system can offer for citizens. PRAXIS also asked a foreign expert Arne Björnberg from Health Consumer Powerhouse (Sweden) to come visit, and he introduce best working practices in developing patient-centered healthcare in European countries. Discussion was chaired by Jarno Habicht (WHO Country Office in Estonia) and it covered three main questions:

1. What could “patient-centered” mean in Estonia 10 years from now? To kick-start the discussion, we had the honor of the Minister of social affairs Hanno Pevkur and the chairman of Estonian Health Insurance Fund Hannes Danilov to give the policymakers’ point of view.

2. What should be changed in healthcare system according to the needs of patients? To introduce this question, the president of Estonian Doctors Union, dr Andrus Mäesalu and chairman of Estonian Lungs Union  Olga Sumbajeva presented the viewspoints of two main interestgroups – doctors and patients.

3. Where to begin? Guests received a task to discuss in groups, what could be the one thing that we could change in treatment procedures today, to make the system more patientfriendly?  

Unfortunately, the policy analysis and other materials are available only in Estonian. For for more information please contact the project coordinator Maiu Uus Maiu.Uus@praxis.ee  or the health policy program director Ain Aaviksoo Ain.Aaviksoo@praxis.ee, or analysts Janek Saluse Janek.Saluse@praxis.ee and Gerli Paat Gerli.Paat@praxis.ee