Serbian Experience with National Health Accounts

Serbia, as many countries in Eastern Europe, is in the process of reforming its health system in an effort to improve the efficiency and efficacy of health services and to achieve equal distribution of health resources. Representatives of Ministry of Health (MOH), Health Insurance Fund (HIF), and Institute of Public Health (IPH) articulated an overall health vision for the health sector in Serbia in August 2002. In order to get reliable information on financial resources used for health, their sources, and the way they were used, policymakers realized that they needed a tool that clearly illustrates the flow of funds through the health system. National health accounts (NHA) (1–4), as such a tool, provides a basis for monitoring different health care activities and trends in health spending for all sectors – public and private, providers, diseases, population groups, and regions in country, so Serbian Government have decided to implement the NHA. Work on development, implementation, and institutionalization of NHA started at the end of 2004, under “Serbia health project,” financed by the World Bank (WB). The conception of the NHA project was divided in two phases, with following achievements: