Healthcare in Croatia

Hi, definitely get a private insurance as you will be in hospital if needed - fast - when you want it. Being in UK now for a while, diagnostics are better in Croatia (they diagnosed my husbands cancer  when in UK for whole year of symptoms - they missed it). However, advanced treatments are not available in Croatia. Some are but for some serious things, I am afraid they still send people to London or Germany for treatments...

Hi, I have a question. Do Croatian clinics and hospitals in  are good? I plan go to a vacation, so i need to know that. Thnx

Hi,

In order to help expats and soon-to-be expats, we would like to invite you to share your experience on this topic, with updated info on the healthcare system.

Thank you in advance,

Julie
Expat.com Team

The health care system in Croatia is poor.  If you have a choice do not use the state subsidised system.  Private health care is a little better, but the best health care is provided to those who know the best doctors in each specialty and who have access to being in the care of these doctors.  If you are fortunate to be recommended to one of these expert doctors they may not even charge you or you may be asked to pay just to get an appointment.  If you are coming to Croatia temporarily, I would recommend avoiding the health care system by staying healthy and visiting your own doctor before you come.  If you are planning to stay long term then you will have to either buy into the local healthy care system in order to have a residence permit or purchase a compatible health plan. I once visited my appointed doctor for a serious ear infection and he was smoking a cigarette in his office while he examined me.  The good doctors often have long waiting lists to get appointments and even when you show up with an appointment slip, you must wait like cattle until your name is called when the doctors are feeling generous to receive patients, and dont be surprised if the doctor leaves before he has gotten to you.  We once showed up for an orthopedic appointment for my son which was scheduled two months in advance at 730 am for what I thought was an 8am appointment.  The doctor received us at 1015 and the appointment lasted less than 10 minutes.  This was at the children's hospital and there were a lot of young families there who seemed to have taken a day off of work to get to thier appointment with their child.  Basically the doctor was like what are you doing here? Your son is healthy go away.  There is no such thing as preventative medicine in Croatia and to say that it is a system designed for sick people rather than for healing, would be a gross understatement.  The mere fact that the country's leading doctor's seek medical treatment outside of the country says it all.  The good thing is that Croatia is a healthy place to live, the sea air is generally scented by rosemary and pine, the water is the absolute best I have ever drunk (no need to buy bottled water here...!), and organic locally grown food is affordable and easy to find....! And people drink thier coffee slowly, there is no hurrying anywhere.

I can only speak to the occurrence my wife experienced while we were expats living on the Dalmatian Coast in Sibenik. She contracted a lung infection with a fever and a cough that kept getting worse.

Our landlady took us to the local clinic on the same day she called to make an appointment for us. We paid $40 (USD) for the emergency visit which included blood work for a lab analysis. A diagnosis was provided within an hour of our visit along with a prescription for two medications. We had to go to the hospital pharmacy to fill them, which our landlady used her medical card to obtain for us at no cost to us.

You will have to determine what it costs to obtain a health card, or you will have to find an 'angel' like our landlady to provide information and guidance.  All I can say is we were blessed during our stay with excellent care when the need arose.

I think the health care here is hit or miss and that your circumstance depended alot on the generosity of one person. Which says alot about the generosity of Croatian people.  We have been living in Croatia for 7 years now and our experience with the health care system is meh... We have been relatively healthy and needed to visit an emergency room only once on a Sunday during the summer. This was also in Sibenik while we were camping my son dove over a stone wall to catch a ball and hit his head on a rock and needed stitches. We actually had to drive an hour north because the clinic was not able to provide services.  They did not end up stitching up his head and he has a huge Harry Potter looking scar on his head.  ......

Having had the benefit? of using both private and public healthcare in Croatia, I find that they are both good. Our doctor is great, You turn up on the day and wait to see him. No making appointments.If you need an x-ray or something its done within a week. Other appointments checking for tumors etc can take a few weeks, but if important within 72 hours. In hospitals as anywhere you get the odd nurse who thinks they are 'gods gift' and think you should be waiting for them to do some thing and it is OK if they leave early. Food is much better than UK hospital and doctors do come and talk to you.
Private practice is very hands on, by the principle doctor and very fast. If you can afford private care its better but the public healthcare a wonderful public service.

I was generally pleased with healthcare in Croatia while I was there (about three years).

I used both the public and private systems. For specialized care, such as gynecology, dermatology, and dentistry, I chose private clinics. For checkups and more general concerns, I used the public healthcare system. The advantage of scheduling private appointments is that you can often be seen right away, and the entire process is usually simpler than trying to find your way around a public facility. In my personal experience, there were more English-speaking employees at the private clinics than at the public facilities. As I do speak workable Croatian, this wasn't a huge issue for me, but there were a couple of confusing moments when I ended up at a hospital and didn't quite understand the routine.

I did not purchase private health insurance. Healthcare in Croatia – even private healthcare – is so affordable (at least compared to the US) that it wasn't a problem for me to pay out of pocket and then be reimbursed by my US insurance company later. I typically paid around 350 hrk for an appointment or an exam at a private clinic. Sometimes this included labs, sometimes labs were a bit extra. Public healthcare costs next to nothing. (If I remember correctly, there was a 10 hrk fee to see the family doctor. My emergency room visit at the hospital cost around 100 hrk, I think. Even with health insurance in the US, you can usually expect to pay at least $75 per ER visit.)

Croatian doctors did sometimes take health concerns a little less seriously than my doctor in the States might have, and they also were less apt to push pills – which was both a blessing and a curse. For example, I had a pretty persistent sinus infection, and I was told to get some saline nasal spray. Eventually it worked and my body healed itself, but there were moments when I just really wanted antibiotics. On the other hand, I found many Croatian doctors to be much more intuitive and sensitive to symptoms and holistic approaches than some of my American doctors. I had a particular issue that a Croatian doctor I saw once picked up on almost immediately, while my American doctors insisted that nothing was wrong multiple times. So I suppose the takeaway here is that experiences can really vary.

The best advice I have is to always ask for recommendations from fellow expats or Croatian friends who may be able to help you navigate the system.

Also, keep in mind that there are some excellent natural/herbal remedies available at pharmacies. A favorite was jaglac (primrose) syrup for a nasty cough and antiseptic cough drops for a sore throat. Pharmacists have great recommendations and can often fix you up until you can get in to see a doctor, if the meds they recommend don't do the trick on their own.