The project that was presented on Tuesday in Sarajevo will build on health-care initiatives in Bosnia and Herzegovina funded by the EU since 1999. It will strongly support the long-term reform and sustainability of the healthcare sector by introducing greater transparency, clarity and understanding of hospital outputs so as to improve efficiency and provide greater access and better care.

The main goal is to implement a system of Diagnosis Related Groups (DRG) data collection and analysis, and develop DRG pricing and contracting based on hospital activity.

“The project began in February this year and we expect it to run until February 2013. It is firmly anchored in improving the well-being of citizens,“ said Natalia Dianiskova, Head of the Operations Section for Social Development, Civil Society and Cross-Border Cooperation at the EU Delegation to BiH.

Dianiskova stressed that patients will be able to see the cost of healthcare in a way that will allow them to compare the quality of hospitals, receive better care and minimise length of stay in hospital.

“We hope the system will be implemented as quickly as possible, though it will necessarily take a number of years,” she said.

Zlatko Čardaklija, Senior Adviser to the Health Minister of BiH Federation, noted that this system is already being implemented in many other countries, including EU member states, and that it provides data on the success of treatment and on realistic pricing for treatment of specific kinds of illness.

“It is a modern approach, through which citizens will have better healthcare,“ Čardaklija said, adding that hospitals in Bosnia and Herzegovina currently lack incentives to provide better service and that, after reforms are implemented, this can change.

Nedeljko Milaković, Assistant Minister at the RS Ministry of Health and Social Care, said the project would result in better data and better service. “This is a way for healthcare facilities to enter the market and show which offers higher quality and which can attract more patients, “Milaković said. He said that under the new system patients would have the right to choose secondary healthcare facilities.

Novka Agić, Director of the Federation Health Care Insurance Fund, said cost rationalization could be expected.

“Double billing will be eliminated, because, when the patient comes from a cantonal hospital to the University Clinical Centre in Sarajevo, for example, he or she won’t have to have a medical examination all over again,” Agić said.

The project is being implemented by an international consortium led by Empirica Communication and Technology Research GmbH, Germany; Karol Consulting and Ericcson Nikola Tesla, Croatia.