In the health centers of the villages of Vlora in southwestern Albania, it is impossible to book a date for blood tests, as there are none.
Even if you can find a free date, it can come to you after two years. This is because the analysis fund is shared between the Vlorë Regional Hospital and the health centers, but the hospital exhausts them all thanks to emergencies and there is nothing left for the health centers.
Such is the case of a 75-year-old man from Tërbaçi i Vlora, who has been on the waiting list for two years. Beshir Abazi had a heart bypass operation in 2012, but the doctors asked him to do routine blood tests every three months ‘to keep the condition under control’.
“For two years I have been trying to do the analysis in the state clinics but I have not been able to. I was forced to do it privately, but for my pension of 15,600 ALL I can’t make it, since I take 14 other medications. I went to the family doctor, who tells me that there are no free dates for you to book. I don’t want to do them once every three months, but I can’t manage to do them once a year. When the date given comes in 2-3 years time, I don’t know if I will be alive” says the 75-year-old.
Along with the journalists of Fiks Fare, the 75-year-old contacts the family doctor Afërdita Metaj via phone. She tells him on the phone that the state has no free dates for two years. Even the few dates that are given are taken immediately, says the doctor.
The investigative program addressed the Vlora Regional Hospital to learn more about the problem. In a phone call with the deputy director of this hospital, Ardi Sheremeri, the latter categorically denies the lack of spaces. “There is a certain number of bandages that are assigned to the polyclinics, as these benefit from the budget of the tests assigned to the hospital. But the analyzes are done regularly,” he says.
The director also explains that they have never encountered such a problem, contrary to what the family doctor of the Brataj Health Center says, and the whistleblower himself.
He says that there is a certain number of monthly bandages that benefit the health centers, but that in reality it does not turn out that way. To Fiks Fare’s question about how much this number is per month, the deputy director asked for an official request, but to this day he has not received an answer.
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