A tool for health system description. Diagnosing the Polish system

The article presents the thesis that there is information available in the public sphere on the basis of which the situation in the Polish health system can be diagnosed. Such a diagnosis would make it possible to identify the problems experienced by patients as ailments and other problems which may lead to missing the chance of positive impact on the health condition. Since the study is focused on and confined to the diagnosis of problems, especially those perceived by patients as limiting, and leaves their explanation to be considered further, the range of sources is necessarily restricted. The following sources are indicated: WHO reports, European Health Consumer Index reports, Centre for Public Opinion Research (Pol. CBOS) reports, National Health Fund (Pol. NFZ) annual reports, WHC BAROMETER results and OECD documents. On this basis, it can be argued that a serious problem for the system is the multi-cause perception of the patients’ failure to meet their health needs, long waiting times for specialist consultation, diagnostic tests and hospitalisations, shortage of time and attention devoted to patients, issues of equal treatment of patients and – oftentimes – dissatisfaction with the functioning of the system. After formulating the outline of the diagnosis presented in this text, considerations were made aimed at explaining the revealed problems.