Treatment Dear In Sweden

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31317, 13 March 1967, Page 2

Treatment Dear In Sweden

(N.Z.P. A.-Reuter) STOCKHOLM. Getting medical attention is an expensive business in Sweden, where everyone is obliged to pay contributions to the national health service.

The service does not include dental treatment and for that reason many people feel that a personal contribution averaging about £25 a year is on the high side. They feel that this is especially so when only about one-third of the £2 15s to £4 paid for a routine medical examination can be claimed from the health scheme. The Swedish system is highly complicated. A man breaking his arm may pay less after weeks in hospital than a man who only thought he might have broken an arm, but had a medical check-up just in case. A patient requiring urgent medical service at night may receive a doctor’s bill for a home call for £5, of which £2 5s can be claimed from the State.

Similarly, a small child taken to hospital out of clinic hours with a suspected broken leg receives a cursory examination from the hospital doctor, and is then sent to have 10 photographs taken in the X-ray department. Later the father receives a bill for £2 for the routine examination by the first doctor, and another for a similar amount from the second doctor, who adds 5s 6d for the X-ray plates. Of the total only £1 10s Is reimbursed by the State. If a boy crashes his toboggan during clinic hours, how-

ever, his father would have to pay only 4s. Swedish doctors earn about £5OOO a year. Because of an acute shortage of hospital staff, the waiting time for non-acute operations may be six months. Once inside a hospital, however, the treatment is efficient and the service good. The Social Insurance Office pays for treatment at all kinds of medical institutions belonging to the State, county councils and the Social Insurance Board.

Treatment at reduced fees is available at State or municipal sanatoriums, mental hospitals and nursing homes. The State also provides cheap alcoholic and smoking cures at leading hospitals. Depending on salary, sickness benefits range up to £1 18s 6d a day. But no benefit is payable for the first three days of sickness.