Malta’s healthcare reckoned to be among the worst in Europe

My wife had to go to the hospital for delivery and I got first hand experience on that. (the people at the delivery rooms are great folks) The rest we experienced was according to the article which follows.

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The Netherlands has retained its position at the top of the annual Euro Health Consumer Index that compares healthcare systems in Europe.

On 48 indicators such as patient rights and information, accessibility, prevention and outcomes, The Netherlands secured its top position among 35 European countries for the fourth year in a row, scoring 870 of a maximum 1,000 points.

In the EU, The Netherlands was followed by Denmark, Belgium and Germany as the countries with the best healthcare, while Romania, Portugal and Latvia scored the lowest.

Malta has been classed among the worst countries, with some notable exceptions.

Malta has been classed in the 26th place among the European nations in the classification, which also includes some non-EU countries like Serbia and Macedonia.

Only Macedonia, Hungary, Albania, Bulgaria, Poland, Latvia and Serbia are worse than Malta. Even Greece and Cyprus are classified better than Malta.

Malta’s miserable position is not the result of under-funding: in fact Malta is middle of the table as regards spending,

Here are some key and significant results for Malta, but the entire document is very interesting and is a complete contrast for instance to the Dalli Report.



Patient rights and information

Malta is classed as third lowest. “More and more states are changing the basic starting point for healthcare legislation, and there is a distinct trend towards expressing laws on healthcare in terms of rights of citizens/patients instead of in terms of (e.g.) obligations of providers (see section describing the indicator Healthcare law based on Patients’ Rights). By 2013, only two out of 34 countries have not introduced healthcare legislation based on Rights of patients: Malta and Sweden!”

Waiting times

Malta has one of the highest waiting times for major elective surgery, and is one of three countries where one can wait more than three weeks for a CT scan (with Serbia and Macedonia). As for waiting in the Emergency Department, Malta, surprisingly with Sweden is the place where one waits more than three hours, while only Ireland, again surprisingly, is worse.

Cancer survival

The rates for Malta have shot up from 45 per cent in 2008 to 60 per cent in 2013.

Preventable years of life lost

Malta is just under the top group of countries in this class. Potential Years of Life Lost are calculated from the number of deaths multiplied by a standard life expectancy at the age at which death occurs. PYLL is preferred as an indicator for the EHCI over and above the popular “Healthcare Amenable Deaths”, as that indicator.

MRSA infections

Malta is classed as third worst, high up in the 50 per cent category along with Romania.

Abortion rates

This is a new classification in EHCI. The report says: “There are four countries in Europe, where free abortion rights do not exist: Cyprus, Ireland, Malta and Poland. These countries have been given the unique new Purple score, equal to zero points).

Equity of healthcare systems

Malta has been classed among the third lowest group, with its rate actually deteriorating from 2010 to 2013.

Operations

While Malta is classed among the middle group, as for cataract operations for the over-65s, it is in the top class for kidney transplants. Not many Maltese seem to go to the public hospital for dental operations.

Middle of the class

Malta rates in the middle group with regard to raised blood pressure among adults, in the top class for smoking prevention and in the lower middle class for hard liquor consumption.

Physical education

Malta is one of the countries with a low amount of hours dedicated to physical education in schools and, maybe as a result, has one of the highest rates for undiagnosed diabetes and the second highest for sugar consumption. Malta is also one of the countries with a low percentage of people who do know that antibiotics do not work against cold and flu.

E-health

Malta is one of the seven countries where e-prescription is not available or rare. It is the only country in Europe where the patient has no access rights to his or her medical record and it is one of eight countries where there is no patient organisation knowledge about cross-border care accessibility.

Other issues

While Malta is once again just below the top group for ‘under the table payments to doctors’, it also boasts one of the highest rates for nursing home and elderly care beds for the over 65s.Yet the spend for the percentage of GDP used for the long-term care of patients over 75 is abysmally low, right off the chart. Then again, Malta is the European champion where dialysis is offered where it suits the patient best. Malta is also in the top cohort for babies being born by Caesarean section with Greece, Cyprus and Italy having more.

Malta’s final classification, notwithstanding the EHCI compilers’ efforts, could have been affected by the fact that there is only one public hospital in Malta.

Speaking at the launch of the EHCI 2013 in Brussels on Thursday, Arne Björnberg of the HCP said the EU could learn a lot from the Dutch on healthcare.

“The Netherlands has what we call ‘a chaos system’, meaning patients have a great degree of freedom, from where to buy their health insurance to where they get their healthcare service. The difference between The Netherlands and other countries is that the chaos is managed. Healthcare decisions are made in a dialogue between the patients and the healthcare professionals,” Björnberg said.

He added that regardless of all the talk about the financial crisis, actual treatment results in European healthcare continued to improve.

“There are a lot of patient organisations who don’t like us saying this because they make a living on telling everybody that everything is going down the drain, and that we need more money and more attention. This might be true, but treatment results are improving,” Björnberg added.

The full report can be accessed at: www.healthpowerhouse.com/files/ehci-201 … report.pdf