Mandić fulfills Izetbegović's wishes, KCUS still without 'university hospital' status

SARAJEVO, (Patria) – Written correspondence between the University of Sarajevo, the University Clinical Center of Sarajevo, and the Federal Ministry of Health regarding the status of KCUS as a "university hospital" has been ongoing for months.

The Rector of UNSA, Rifat Škrijelj, issued a temporary decision in May on fulfilling the conditions for university hospital status, but KCUS was obliged to supplement the documentation they submitted with the application.
The procedure for awarding the title of university hospital is renewed every five years in accordance with the provisions of the Health Protection Act and the Rulebook on the conditions that hospitals must meet to be awarded the title of university hospital, adopted by the Federal Minister of Health in 2010. KCUS received the decision in 2015, which expired at the end of May this year.

The Federal Minister of Health, Vjekoslav Mandić, made a proposal on May 13 regarding the fulfillment of conditions based on KCUS's request. The further explanation also stated that a proposal is being made for "UNSA Clinical Center to be a teaching base for the Faculty of Medicine, Faculty of Pharmacy, Faculty of Health Studies, and Faculty of Dentistry," although this should not be an integral part of the request for awarding the status of "university hospital."

KCUS forwarded the documentation for further processing to the Rector of the University of Sarajevo, as according to the Rulebook, the Rector makes the decision by which the hospital is awarded the title of university hospital or a decision rejecting the request. Upon reviewing the documentation, it was determined that complete documentation as prescribed by the Rulebook was not submitted with the request.

For the past four years, KCUS has not submitted reports on conducted teaching, nor has it submitted opinions from teaching-scientific councils, except for the Faculty of Medicine, whose students would conduct teaching. Therefore, the director of KCUS, Sebija Izetbegović, was supposed to collect opinions from the Teaching-Scientific Councils of the Faculties of Dentistry, Pharmacy, and Health Studies, whose students have classes at KCUS, and reports on conducted teaching, which would have completed the request. The Rector has repeatedly informed both KCUS and the Federal Ministry of this. KCUS submitted a consolidated report on conducted teaching but not the opinions of the three teaching-scientific councils; instead, they requested that an opinion from the Groupation be issued.

A clear procedure is described in Article 104 of the Health Protection Act of FBiH.

"A hospital can obtain the status of a university hospital, which is awarded by a public university, upon the proposal of the Federal Ministry, and with the prior opinion of the health-oriented faculties, if teaching is conducted in the hospital within the framework of university education. The status of a university hospital from paragraph 1 of this article is awarded for a period of five years. Teaching from paragraph 1 of this article can be conducted with the prior consent of the federal minister for education and science and the federal minister," it states.

Instead of submitting the requested documentation, KCUS insisted on being issued a decision on the status of "university hospital," accusing the Rector of delaying the procedure. While correspondence was ongoing between Rector Škrijelj and the University Clinical Center UNSA, the Federal Ministry of Health issued a Decision on May 13, 2020, amending the Decision of May 13 based on KCUS's request. The key change in this amendment compared to the original decision from May is that "a proposal is made for the University of Sarajevo Clinical Center to be a teaching base for the UNSA Faculty of Medicine." This decision by Federal Minister Vjekoslav Mandić also violated the Law on Higher Education of KS, which clearly stipulates in Article 151 that KCUS is a teaching base for all organizational units belonging to the group of medical sciences. This law has been in effect since August 1, 2017.

On September 7, Rector Škrijelj sent a letter to Minister Mandić, informing him of the entire correspondence and requests to KCUS regarding missing documentation, requesting an interpretation of the Rulebook in his capacity as the issuer, and warning about the consequences of acting on Minister Mandić's decision of September 1, which declared KCUS a teaching base only for the Faculty of Medicine.

On several occasions, a meeting of representatives of the University and the Secretary of the Federal Ministry of Health was requested, but these requests were never answered, and a written response was received on September 15, exempting them from any responsibility and avoiding providing an interpretation of the Rulebook's provisions. The last part of the response states that "the organization of the teaching process at the faculties within the Groupation of Medical Sciences of the University of Sarajevo, in accordance with the Law on Higher Education, is the exclusive jurisdiction of the University of Sarajevo, as well as the health institution that is the teaching base for the faculties of the mentioned Groupation." With this response, the Federal Ministry acknowledged that KCUS is a teaching base for all faculties from the Groupation of Medical Sciences, thus including the Faculties of Dentistry, Health Studies, and Pharmacy.

In one of its letters to the Rector, the University Clinical Center UNSA referred to the Statute and Senate of UNSA, so it should be reminded that Article 34 of the Statute of the University of Sarajevo specifies that "the Clinical Center in Sarajevo is the primary clinical teaching base for the faculties of the Groupation of Medical Sciences of the University."

After receiving the response from the Federal Ministry of Health, Rector Škrijelj sent a letter to KCUS, the Faculty of Health Studies, the Faculty of Pharmacy, the Faculty of Medicine, and the Faculty of Dentistry, informing them about the decisions of the Federal Ministry of Health of May 13 and September 1, and the response of September 15.

"The University of Sarajevo will consider the submitted documentation in the further procedure for awarding the status of university hospital based on the submitted request from the University Clinical Center UNSA," the letter states.

It is expected that the deans of the mentioned faculties will send a letter to Minister Mandić due to the amendment of the decision based on KCUS's request to be a teaching base only for the Faculty of Medicine, which directly harms students and makes it impossible to conduct teaching at KCUS. The temporary decision on university hospital status is also about to expire, and the start of the new academic year is approaching.

If this situation is not resolved in the next few days, the entire case could end up in court.