Last year, a Memorandum of Patient Organisations was established at the conference Oncology in Slovakia and the Ministry of Health of the Slovak Republic is familiar with this memoranda. And not only that. Many of the topics proposed by the patient organisations in that memorandum have already been resolved by the Ministry or are in the process of implementation:
screening programmes are restarted after the pandemic;

b/ the number of verified mammographic workplaces is increasing from 16 to 19, while the resort is also in contact with other workplaces;

c/ the relevant commissions also discuss reimbursement and implementation of TOKS, i. e. occult bleeding tests, once a year, as established and in other European countries;

d/ as regards USG breast prevention, evidence-based medicine and application practice confirmed USG over-use and inefficiencies, as well as iatrogenicisation of non-symptomed women, and therefore the entire management of active breast cancer search (including age interval adjustment for state guaranteed screening to 45-75 years) plans to modify the resort by amending the amendment of Act 577/2004, which is in preparation and regulates screening conditions in general for the population of women in Slovakia (without the possibility of opportunistic screening and the possibility of over-exercising ineffective preventative USG breasts). The entire screening process needs to be streamlined. The amendment to the Act is prepared in accordance with the recommendations of the European Commission in Brussels, with which we actively cooperate with the National Cancer Institute (NOI);

e/ as a major joint success of the Ministry, insurance companies and representatives of patient organisations, we consider free vaccination against HPV virus from May 2022, namely with the nanovalent vaccine – so far this vaccination is paid for by girls and boys between the 12th and 13th years of life. Health insurance companies also provide other benefits for young people under 18. However, the health department continues to discuss these vaccines with insurance companies for other age groups;

f/ revolution in drug policy - amendment of Law 363/2011 has finally brought literal order into the authorisation and registration procedures for medicines, thus ensuring access to innovative treatment for a number of cancer patients. New instruments have also been introduced to ensure that resources are spent efficiently and efficiently;

g/ Ministry also revised the standard procedures for screening mammography and prepares their update in 2022;

h/ a new approach to palliative care is one large and independent chapter in investment in the Recovery and Resilience Plan of Slovakia. The aim of the resort is to extend and restore home nursing care by building and setting up new ADOS and refurbishing 80 existing ADOS. We also want to create more than 600 beds of follow-up care, expand and renew residential palliative care or material-technical support 26 mobile hospices;
i/ The restoration and resilience plan of the Slovak Republic will provide means to reform the network of hospitals, to better equip them, which will certainly also affect diagnosis of cancer and patient care;

The Ministry also set up a monitoring committee to provide annual monitoring reports on the state of Slovak health. It includes not only health professionals or healthcare providers but also patients. The monitoring reports, which will be published on the Ministry's website, will include an evaluation of predefined measures and indicators. This will give the Ministry of Health an effective tool to monitor long-term developments, while being able to set targets flexibly for the years to come.

k/ already this year, we have already engaged in supporting the education and promotion of prevention and screening programmes, in particular through the relevant working group which prepared a new communication called onco-control. This group operates under the Ministry of Health, represented by patient organisations, health insurance companies and the National Cancer Institute, which cooperates closely and coordinates their outputs in the public and media. The professional guarantor of the content is NOI, the guarantor of communication of MZ SR;l/ within the NOI, a call for patient organisations to provide funding for their projects amounting to 100 thousand Euro. MZ SR is part of the International Agency for Cancer Research (IARC) project to support cancer control in Eastern Europe. All these concrete actions mean a multiplication of efforts in all health sectors, with emphasis on on oncology. We cannot allow the creation of a new pandemic of cancers throughout Europe or worldwide.


The Ministry will therefore focus on other activities in the near future: