Healthcare in Portugal: Hospitals and Health Insurance
Healthcare in Portugal
With a population of just over 10.3 million in 2015, Portugal ranks 88th in the world by population and 111th by total area. The official language of Portugal is Portuguese. The currency is the euro.
Portugal ranks 12th in world health ranking per WHO. In 2014, the total expenditure on health per person was $2,690, which is 9.5% of the GDP. Portuguese males have a life expectancy at birth of 78 years, and females can expect to live 84 years. There are 3.86 physicians per 1,000 people in Portugal as compared with 2.56 physicians per 1,000 people in the United States.
Hospitals in Portugal
Portugal’s Health Regulatory Entity (ERS) regulates the activity of all public, private, and social healthcare providers. Public hospitals (classified as general, district, central, or specialized) belong to a network associated with the National Health Service (NHS), which is managed by the Ministry of Health. Primary care is available at health centers in local communities. The hospitals and health centers in a certain city or region are grouped and integrated into a single administrative unit.
Private facilities and professionals are also available for those with private insurance or those belonging to special professional health schemes. Many of these are part of networks of facilities owned by private healthcare corporations.
Health Insurance in Portugal
Healthcare is Portugal consists of 3 systems:
The National Health Service (NHS), managed by the Ministry of Health and funded by general taxation provides universal public healthcare to all legal residents. Recently, co-pays have been implemented for some services in order to sustain the program.
Special social health insurance schemes exist for certain public and private professions (25% of population). Public groups include armed forces personnel, police, prison guards, probation officers, etc. The state is responsible for funding these subsystems. Private groups are financed either by employee and/or employer contributions.
Voluntary private health insurance (10-20% of population) complements the other systems,and is supervised by the MOH.
Travel (International) Health Insurance in Portugal
Many European countries offer European Health Insurance card (EHIC ) which offers emergency medical coverage when traveling to participating European countries. Travel, or international, health insurance provides comprehensive medical coverage when traveling outside of one’s home country. Travel health insurance is different from travel insurance, as the latter may provide only emergency coverage but not full medical coverage.
Travelers should check with their health insurance provider, as they may already have an option of international health coverage. If they do not, they can purchase travel health insurance from their home country or the destination country.
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