Bulgaria Patients Set to Pay in Cash over Unpaid Doctor's Wages

Raychinov stated that the NHIF has still not paid the funds due for hospital maintenance and local doctors for November and that most hospitals in the country have therefore not been able to pay their doctors. Photo by BGNES

The Chairman of the Bulgarian Medical Association (BMA), Dr. Tsvetan Raychinov, has stated that patients will have to pay in cash for all medical services in hospitals and to General Practitioners from Wednesday unless the National Health Insurance Fund pays the due funds for November.

Raychinov stated that the NHIF has still not paid the funds due for hospital maintenance and local doctors for November and that most hospitals in the country have therefore not been able to pay their doctors. He also called on Bulgaria Finance Minister, Simeon Djankov, to act urgently as he recently promised to do.

“We will issue financial documents for the cash payments to the treasury or directly to the finance minister after the funds are paid. How can a GP carry on doing normal check ups without money, when each check-up costs at least BGN 5-6, This is simple but it seems that Simeon Djankov is the only one who doesn’t understand,” Raychinov added.

Dissatisfaction amongst GPs started when the NHIF failed to pay their wages for November 2009. Moreover, only 30% of the amount due to hospitals was paid by the Fund for the same month.