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3,750 inadequate care providers registered in the EU

The Minister of Health, Welfare and Sport Edith Schippers, yesterday hosted a conference on the EU's alert mechanism for inadequate care providers. Since the mechanism came into effect in January, the Netherlands had received around 3,750 notifications from 12 of the other 27 EU member states by mid-June.


The 3,750 notifications received by the Netherlands included nine individuals in the Netherlands who were listed on the Healthcare Professionals (BIG) Register. The standard procedure was applied to record the foreign measures imposed on these individuals in the BIG register. The measures may involve a care provider being struck off the register or having restrictions imposed on their practice.

Notifying each other

The European warning mechanism was created at the initiative of the Minister of Health, Welfare and Sport, Edith Schippers. It came into effect on 18 January 2016 and requires EU member states to notify each other of measures imposed on doctors, dentists and other registered care providers which ban them from practising their profession or impose restrictions. The alert mechanism applies to new measures imposed from that date onwards.

The conference, which is being held as part of the Dutch EU Presidency, will evaluate a number of topics, including people's experiences with the alert mechanism. This will involve other EU member states, relevant professional bodies and the European Commission.

First step

Ms Schippers is pleased with the results. 'This is a promising first step at European level. It will enable us to protect patients against care providers who are not performing adequately. That's good news for the quality and safety of healthcare. However, we're seeing that some countries are not using the system. We need to look at this together. What's working well and where can we make improvements? What are the experiences of member states? How do other countries implement the system and what can we learn from each other?'

Adopting measures

Notification is mandatory within the EU. Then it is up to individual countries to decide how to implement a foreign ban or restriction. The Netherlands enters around 35 notifications in the system each year. Since January, it has shared 13 notifications in the EU's alert system.

 

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