The medical practice owned by gynaecologist Davor Majić from Split is facing foreclosure due to amassed debt in the amount of 600.000 kuna, reports Slobodna Dalmacija on September 6, 2017.
Majić has a practice in Omiška street in Split, but he also has a contract with the Croatian Health Insurance Fund (HZZO) that makes him able to provide state-financed healthcare to 7000 patients.
Twelve years ago, he sued the Health Centre in Donji Miholjac, as he was supposed to sign a 10-year contract with the practice in Slavonia after pursuing his subspecialty in the Clinical Hospital Centre in Split.
Majić ended up staying in Split, as the city was lacking four medical teams specialising in gynaecology, so we was granted a contract by the HZZO in 2003. However, the County Court in Osijek passed a verdict in the favour of the Health Centre, stating Majić was to fulfill his obligation to the medical institution in Donji Miholjac. Majić ended up facing an enforcement procedure in June 2017.
In recent months, charges were enforced in the amount of 96.652 kuna, equaling approximately three monthly amounts of 30.000 kuna regularly provided by the HZZO. Even though the practice is now left without any funds, Majić is still seeing patients, and they have been signing the petition calling for the doctor to keep working in Split.
“A couple of hundred patients signed the petition, we lost count since… Where will these women go if we close the practice? All gynaecology departments in the city are completely full. Given the situation, I think Mayor Andro Krstulović Opara and Prefect Blaženko Boban should react. Even if they don’t care about what’s going to happen to these 7000 women, they should consider the fact I keep paying the County a concession fee of 1250 kuna a month”, Majić said bitterly. He still stands by his opinion that no damage was done to the Health Centre in Donji Miholjac, as the funds for his specialisation were provided by the HZZO.
“The supervisory board of the Health Centre in Donji Miholjac decided to partially postpone the enforcement, allowing me to pay them a monthly fee of 3000 kuna in the next twelve months, followed by the rest of the debt to be repayed after a year has passed. Instead of complying with the agreement and serving me with a monthly bill of 3000 kuna so I wouldn’t go bankrupt and the practice could remain open, they have been taking my entire monthly fund provided by the HZZO”, Majić said.
Asked about the agreement signed on July 5, 2017, head of the Health Centre in Donji Miholjac, Nedeljko Kovačić, stated that Majić failed to authenticate his signature on the contract, making the document legally void. “The agreement can’t be legally enforced now, what reason do we have to trust him? We’re now acting according to the verdict passed by the County Court in Osijek. I feel sorry for Majić, just as I would feel sorry for any other man, but he ignored his obligation to our institution. He hasn’t spent a single minute working here, and he was legally bound to stay for ten years. For that reason, 6000 women in the area were left without proper gynaecology services, and we were forced to sign unfavourable contracts with hospital doctors”, said Kovačić.
According to Kovačić, Majić had 12 years to come to a mutually beneficial agreement with the health centre, but failed to do so. “He’s now applying pressure to competent institutions instead, including us at the Health Centre. However, I’m obliged to comply with institutional contracts and court verdicts. We are all sorry it has come to this”, concluded Kovačić.
Translated from Slobodna Dalmacija.
