If you believe that a medical professional or medical institution have not provided you with adequate or appropriate quality medical care or have acted neglectfully, you can submit an application to the National Agency for Public Health. In certain situations, you may also submit an application to the Police or the Prosecutor’s Office and ask them to initiate a criminal investigation.
Contraventions procedure
If a medical professional or medical institution have not provided you with adequate or appropriate quality medical care or have acted neglectfully, you can initiate contraventions proceedings by submitting an application to the National Agency for Public Health . In your application, you should describe the situation you are complaining about in detail, including what the medical professional or medical institution have done or failed to do. You must also describe how these actions or omissions have harmed your reproductive health.
After receiving your application, the Public Health Agency will decide whether to commence contraventions proceedings. If a decision not to initiate these proceedings is made, you will receive a written reply to your application. If the National Agency for Public Health decides that it needs to carry out a more detailed investigation, it will commence the contraventions proceedings, contact you and inform you about your right to be recognized as a victim in the case.
Criminal procedure
If a medical professional has unlawfully failed to fulfil his/her professional duties or has fulfilled them negligently, and such offence has resulted in serious bodily injury or has infected you with HIV, you can ask for a criminal investigation to be initiated according to the Criminal Procedure Code.
The severity of the bodily injury is determined by a series of criteria, such as their danger to life, anatomical loss of an organ or its function, length of health disorder in time, the percentage of reduced general work capacity etc. You can find a description of the types of bodily injuries which are considered serious, in the Regulation on the forensic assessment of the seriousness of bodily injury. In such a situation, you can request the initiation of criminal proceedings by submitting an application to the Police. In your application, you should describe the situation in detail, including, what the medical professional has done or failed to do, and explain the kind of harm that has been caused to your health.
example If omission or negligence by a medical professional has caused the termination of your pregnancy, this will be considered to be a serious bodily injury and you can request the initiation of criminal proceedings.
After receiving your application, the investigator may decide to commence criminal proceedings and in such a situation will contact you and inform you about your right to be recognized as a victim in the case. You will also be informed about the possibility of requesting compensation for any material damages, or compensation for the bodily and moral harm that you have suffered.
note You can also submit an application to the National Agency for Public Health. If, after detailed investigation, the National Agency for Public Health suspects that these criminal offences may have taken place, it must forward the case materials to the police for criminal investigation.