“Since January, I have been calling clinics to get my tests done. They tell me to wait until June-July, because there is no money.” The ordeal of a patient with multiple sclerosis and diabetes

For three months, Eduard Pletea, who has multiple sclerosis and type 2 diabetes, has been calling clinics under contract with the Health Insurance Company, in an attempt to get his tests done to monitor the conditions he suffers from. Although, in theory, the analyzes he needs are settled 100% by the Romanian state, he is told that there is no money: “The ceiling has been exhausted”.

• “I've been calling for 3 months and I can't find funds anywhere for settled analyses”, says, in a dialogue with HotNews, Eduard Pletea, who is also the president of the Association of Patients with Neurodegenerative Diseases in Romania.
• “And I'm not the only one, I know many patients who have to pay, they have nothing to do,” he adds.
• In fact, several of the largest patient associations in Romania, representing patients with autoimmune, neurodegenerative, liver diseases, diabetes, multiple sclerosis or primary immunodeficiencies, recently sent an open letter to the Ministry of Health and the National Health Insurance House in which they say that some of them have been trying for over 4 months, without success, to access medical tests settled through the Health Insurance House.
• HotNews asked both the National Health Insurance House and the Ministry of Health what measures they have in mind to solve this situation and to ensure patients' access to settled medical investigations. The response of the two institutions did not come until the time of publication of this article.

“I was told that I can only do analysis if I pay”

To Eduard Pletea, most of the private clinics he called, which have a contract with the National Health Center, told him that he can only do tests if he pays them. Others told him that they could do them with a co-payment: to pay 50% of the value of the analyses. Although these analyzes can be settled in full.

On April 1, he called several clinics again, hoping to get an appointment. He has been doing this since January. He was told that it might be possible to do fully settled analyzes only in June-July, when a budget supplement for settled analyzes is expected.

“If on the 1st, when the funds from the Health Insurance House are theoretically allocated, they (employees of the clinics – ed.) say, at 9 o'clock in the morning, that they don't have the funds even to do analyzes in May, but I could only make an appointment with them in June-July…”, he says, in the dialogue with HotNews.

In addition, “I can't even sit and call all the private clinics every day, to see if they have funds or not. There should be somewhere centralized all the medical service providers under contract with CNAS and see who has availability for settled tests, not to sit and call each of them every day”, he says.

Moreover, he had to make an extra trip to the family doctor. The referral ticket for settled tests, issued in January and valid for 3 months, has expired. Now he had to go back to the GP to cancel the old ticket and a new one would be issued. But he doesn't know if he'll have a place to use it.

“I risk my condition getting worse”

The analyzes that Eduard Pletea needs are for monitoring type 2 diabetes and cost 700-800 lei.

He says, in the dialogue with HotNews, that he will most likely choose to pay them, “from the little I have”, because he needs to monitor his illness: “I can't wait for the CNAS, when they allocate funds, because I risk my condition getting worse. It seems that nobody cares anymore”.

In addition to the tests for diabetes, an MRI is added to monitor multiple sclerosis, which they must do annually. The MRI costs 2,000 lei without contrast material. With contrast material, it exceeds this amount.

This, given that, says Eduard Pletea, a research conducted in 2023 by the patients' association shows that one in three people with multiple sclerosis earned less than 2,000 lei a month: “How can that person afford monitoring, to be able to manage their disease properly?”

“You're walking blind and you don't know what's going on with your body”

Starting in 2021, patients with serious chronic conditions benefited from MRI and other investigations under the Monitor regime: based on the referral ticket with the Monitor code, they could undergo emergency medical investigations in a few days. Even if the monthly limit for free tests was exhausted by the respective clinic, the Monitor investigations were settled on a separate invoice.

But last year, the Health Insurance House and the Ministry of Health decided that a patient has the right to only one Monitor investigation of the same type, settled as an emergency, per year.

However, since there is no system that can be used to monitor whether a patient is at the first such investigation in that year or has had several, the clinics avoid offering them, says Eduard Pletea: “To be sure that the CNAS does not cancel their account, they no longer offer Monitor tests. Some clinics make patients write a declaration on their own responsibility that they have not done the respective investigation under the Monitor regime this year. But others do not offer it at all.”

Eduard Pletea says that the Monitor analyses, introduced in 2021, “offered permanent monitoring and reduced the risk of a patient becoming a permanent cost, ending up with a disability. Because a disabled patient becomes a permanent cost to society. A cost that Romania will pay in the long term, instead of investing and doing the prevention part”.

Also thanks to these analyses, he adds, the delay in diagnosing multiple sclerosis has decreased to an average of 3.5 years, from 6 to 7 years previously.

“There are a lot of variables, uncontrollable, when you go blindly and you don't know what's happening with your body: whether the disease is progressing or not. That's why careful, continuous, early monitoring is needed. It's unfortunate that we can't monitor and prevent disability. As long as there's degeneration and there's progression, there's no way to go back, to recover what you've lost. That's why it's important not to lose. Or to lose as little as possible. And that's why monitoring is important”, says the representative of patients with multiple sclerosis.

Especially since, he adds, in many cases it is about young patients, at an active age.

“It translates directly into suffering”

Seven patient associations representing patients with autoimmune, neurodegenerative, liver diseases, diabetes, multiple sclerosis or primary immunodeficiencies have recently sent an open letter to the Ministry of Health and the National Health Insurance House.

They demand “ensuring predictable and real access to settled analysis”, given that “repeatedly, from the first day of the month, the funds are already consumed”.

For patients, “this means either postponing essential investigations or bearing the costs out of their own pocket”, explain the representatives of the NGOs that defend their rights

In addition, they point out that “the situation is aggravated by legislative changes that came into force on January 1, 2026, by which the settlement of Monitor-type investigations was limited to one investigation per year for each patient. This change, although apparently administrative, had a major impact in practice: the number of investigations decreased by approximately 47% in January 2026 compared to the average of the previous quarter.”

For certain pathologies, say the patient representatives, especially neurological, cardiovascular, cerebrovascular, hepatic, but also immunological ones, “this limitation is profoundly inappropriate. These diseases require repeated monitoring in a short period of time, to assess progression, adjust treatment and prevent severe complications.”

In the absence of disease monitoring investigations, the risk of worsening of the condition increases, the number of emergency hospitalizations increases and the long-term costs for the health system increase, say patient NGOs.

The letter also states, “the lack of clarity regarding the implementation of these changes has created chaos: providers apply different rules, patients are sent back to doctors to redo referral tickets, and some providers refuse investigations.”

“This administrative silence translates directly into suffering for patients,” say the NGOs that defend the rights of patients with serious chronic conditions.