Sebija Izetbegović objects to private practices, but not to KCUS doctors' pharmacies

For a little over a year, about 40 top doctors have left or been forced out of the Clinical Center in Sarajevo. Such a loss will not be compensated for in the next ten years. About ten of these 40 doctors are professors. The new competition announced by KCUS for about 50 specializations will not be able to mitigate the damage caused. However, director and manager Sebija Izetbegović is not concerned about this situation at all, writes the Patria agency.

Therefore, she continued with the "cleansing" of doctors, and the latest in the series is the renowned orthopedic surgeon and world expert prof.dr. Ismet Gavrankapetanović. At the beginning of this week, information surfaced that prof.dr. Gavrankapetanović was dismissed from the position of head of the Clinic for Orthopedics and Traumatology of KCUS. The justification provided by KCUS after salvos of criticism from the public, as well as numerous colleagues from BiH, the region, and Europe, was that his contract expired after 19 years. Anyone with a basic understanding of legal matters knows that contract extension is a mere formality if both the employer and the employee have the same goal and desire to continue the cooperation. This could have been the case here as well. However, it is clear that this contract was just an excuse for the dismissal of dr. Gavrankapetanović. KCUS has not commented on the existence of a contract addendum that expires in April 2018.

However, what director Izetbegović did not expect was the support from colleagues at the Clinic for doctor Gavrankapetanović, who signed a document opposing the new structure of the Clinic and the way the long-time head was dismissed. The KCUS Supervisory Board received the document for review with 14 signatures, and then the persecution of doctors who "dared" to put their signature (read: opposed manager Izetbegović) began. The profession supported dr. Gavrankapetanović, and that remains a fact, and it is up to the management of KCUS to explain why numerous projects in which this hospital participates are jeopardized precisely thanks to this expert.

While orthopedic colleagues in Vienna, Zagreb, and Munich are throwing their hands up and appealing for dr. Gavrankapetanović to remain head of the Clinic, the management of KCUS prefers to engage in investigative actions and threaten criminal charges for the signatures of support.

These threats and pressures have indeed borne fruit, as doctors Đemil Omerović, Hadžan Konjo, and Fuad Džanković have withdrawn their signatures.

And while Izetbegović objects to doctors who have private practices, she does not object to doctors with private pharmacies.

Thus, dr. Omerović, along with his family members, owns the company "VERDANT," which engages in domestic and foreign trade and is the founder of the private pharmacy Verdant. According to information available to Patria, Omerović was blackmailed that cooperation with the pharmacy would be suspended if he did not withdraw his signature from the letter of support.

Doctor Jasmin Kapetanović, president of the KCUS Supervisory Board, also owns the Dina pharmacy together with his wife, a good friend of director Izetbegović. Patients are sent from KCUS to Dina pharmacies for necessary medical supplies and medications, and the costs are reimbursed by health insurance institutes. Izetbegović is accountable to no one for such dealings, nor for endangering the health of citizens because they cannot receive full medical assistance at KCUS.

The most severely ill cancer patients have already raised their voices because they could not receive therapy due to a malfunction of the equipment. For more than a year, there have been no reagents needed for tests, no basic medical supplies, gloves, gauze...

If the exodus of doctors from this Sarajevo hospital continues, the citizens of BiH will have every right to file criminal charges against the management of KCUS and director Sebija Izetbegović for endangering the right to treatment and the right to life.