The deficit of state-funded outpatient services in Latvia is so great that it can only be resolved by allocating additional funds, said Artūrs Berziņš, chairman of the board of the Latvian Hospital Association (LSB), in an interview with the program "900 Seconds" on TV3.
According to him, even a family doctor, when trying to refer a patient for outpatient examination or to a state-funded specialist, realizes that the queue will be so long that the only real opportunity to receive this service in a timely manner at the expense of budget funds is to go to the hospital's emergency department. This means that a situation has developed in which hospitals are forced to inefficiently spend the available resources, Berziņš confirmed.
A representative of the Hospital Association stated that the deficit of state-funded outpatient services remains very large year after year, which means that the problem has already worsened, and patients have accumulated health issues. "The demand is so high, and services are provided in deficit, and only by increasing funding can we extinguish this fire in the outpatient department," said Berziņš.
He added that expanding the availability of outpatient services will reduce the burden on hospital emergency departments and also decrease the number of patients arriving with various problems.
Berziņš has also repeatedly emphasized the issue of medical staff shortages, as a result of which the industry is forced to raise salaries, and state institutions can no longer hire staff.
The head of LSB believes that Latvia has approached the threshold where the next step will be classical paid medicine.
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