Can Ukrainian patients protect their rights in the event of a medical error?
Kyiv • UNN
In Ukraine, patients are increasingly organizing into grassroots movements due to a lack of trust in official mechanisms for protecting rights in the healthcare sector. Given the prolonged legal proceedings in medical negligence cases and the difficulties in obtaining forensic medical examinations, the question arises as to whether the healthcare system is capable of independently identifying medical errors, responding to them effectively and timely, and, most importantly, preventing potential tragedies.
Public patient initiatives complaining about the inadequate quality of medical services have effectively taken on the function of recording cases of medical negligence. One of the most well-known such movements is StopOdrex – an association of people who consider themselves or their relatives to be victims of treatment at the private Odesa clinic "Odrex." Whether the emergence of such initiatives indicates a crisis of trust in official patient protection mechanisms and whether the healthcare system is capable of monitoring the quality of medical care itself, read in the UNN article.
The public initiative StopOdrex collects and publishes patient stories about their experiences with treatment at the private Odesa clinic "Odrex." These are people who consider themselves or their relatives to be victims of the actions of the clinic's staff. They seek publicity for their stories and support from those who have walked a similar path.
In effect, StopOdrex operates as an open archive of patient stories. On the website and in the movement's Telegram channel, anonymous stories are published regarding treatment errors, possible complications following treatment, difficulties in obtaining medical documentation, lengthy legal proceedings, and the lack of rapid response from official institutions. Such initiatives do not replace either the investigation or the court, but they prevent patient stories from disappearing into bureaucratic silence.
Oksana Dmytriieva, a Member of Parliament of Ukraine and member of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on National Health, Medical Care, and Medical Insurance, believes that such patient associations may be a signal that people do not trust the official mechanisms existing in the state.
Photo: Oksana Dmytriieva, Member of Parliament of Ukraine, member of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on National Health, Medical Care, and Medical Insurance
The emergence of patient mutual aid groups on social networks is, in my opinion, a signal of people's demand for support, explanation, and fair consideration. It is also partly about an insufficient level of trust in official mechanisms. When people seek protection from one another, the system must ask itself: why are they not confident that they will receive it within the framework of existing procedures
A similar assessment was voiced by political scientist and director of the Center for Civil Society Studies, Vitaliy Kulyk. In his opinion, the emergence of movements like StopOdrex is an indicator that some patients do not believe in the system's ability to respond quickly and effectively to possible cases of medical negligence.
A separate systemic problem is the multi-year legal proceedings and expert examinations in cases of possible medical negligence, which leave both patients and doctors in uncertainty for years.
We need to talk about the duration of case reviews, expert examinations, and court processes. Because justice must be not only objective but also timely – for both the patient and the doctor. In my opinion, a strong healthcare system is a system where independent professional control works, with clear response mechanisms and a balance between protecting patient rights and fair treatment of the medical professional
A striking example of how patients and doctors wait years for answers to their questions in medical negligence cases is the story of Svitlana Huk. She has been trying for six years to get an answer regarding the causes of her husband's death after treatment at the Odrex clinic.
A similar scenario is currently unfolding in the case regarding the death of businessman Adnan Kivan during treatment at Odrex. There, the court was supposed to proceed to the examination of medical evidence and the interrogation of an independent expert oncologist; however, at that exact moment, the defense of one of the accused doctors secured the transfer of the proceedings to another court. As a result, the process is effectively starting over.
And the more such stories appear, the more acute the question becomes – is the healthcare system capable of independently identifying possible medical errors, responding to them, and preventing the recurrence of similar situations? At the same time, Dmytriieva emphasizes that it would be wrong to speak of a complete absence of mechanisms for protecting patient rights in Ukraine.
Today, a patient can turn to the facility's administration, specialized bodies, the Ministry of Health, the National Health Service of Ukraine, the Verkhovna Rada Commissioner for Human Rights, as well as the law enforcement system or the court. Such tools exist
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However, the key question lies not only in the formal existence of such mechanisms, but in how effective, fast, and understandable they are for a person. And whether they work as a system that not only reacts to a problem but also prevents its recurrence. Dmytriieva names the creation of a system of medical self-governance, which is still not legislatively regulated in Ukraine, as one possible solution.
In many countries, medical self-governance plays an important role – professional bodies that have the authority to review disputed cases, conduct professional assessments of a doctor's actions, apply disciplinary measures, issue warnings, limit or terminate the right to professional activity, and, if necessary, transfer information to law enforcement agencies. In Ukraine, the law on medical self-governance has not yet been adopted. And this issue should be discussed not as a formality, but as one of the possible tools for increasing accountability and trust in the system. After all, the assessment of complex medical decisions should primarily be given by specialists who understand the clinical context, standards of treatment, and professional risks
At the same time, she emphasized that such a system should work not as a closed corporate solidarity of "doctor-to-doctor" and not as a punishment mechanism, but as an independent professional institution – in the interests of the entire healthcare system of Ukraine.