From 2025, the MSEC will be replaced by a new assessment system: what will change for Ukrainians
Kyiv • UNN
The Verkhovna Rada has passed a law on the liquidation of medical and social expert commissions from January 1, 2025. Instead of the MSEC, 1,348 expert teams will start working in 286 hospitals, which will assess functioning according to new standards.
From January 1, 2025, a new system for assessing daily functioning will be launched, which will be carried out by expert teams of practicing physicians, and the outdated system of medical and social expertise will be liquidated, reports UNN. The Verkhovna Rada adopted a law on the liquidation of medical and social expert commissions from January 1, 2025.
The Minister of Health of Ukraine, Viktor Liashko, reported that 1,348 expert teams have already been formed, which include more than 4,300 doctors. "This is more than three times more than in the MSEC. They will work in 286 hospitals throughout Ukraine", Liashko wrote.
According to him, the key innovations are:
- A new approach to assessment: expert teams will conduct assessments in an electronic system that takes into account the real needs of the person;
- Transparency and depersonalization of processes: teams will be formed automatically on a random basis, and the data of doctors and patients will remain hidden until the assessment;
- Possibility of appeal: the decisions of the expert teams can be appealed to the Functional Status Assessment Centers, which will include doctors from public healthcare institutions from all over the country;
- Implementation of international standards: the law lays the foundation for the use of the International Classification of Functioning (ICF) in education, social and other spheres;
- Preservation of the validity of old documents: all certificates and documents issued by the MSEC before January 1, 2025 remain valid. They will continue to be the basis for receiving social guarantees, rights, benefits, pensions, compensations and other payments during the validity period of the documents;
- Transfer of cases from the MSEC: the MSEC is obliged to ensure the transfer of all available medical and expert files and archival documents to the designated healthcare institutions;
- Data transparency: statistical data on the assessment of daily functioning will be made public for public monitoring and prevention of corruption.
The new system receives more than 1.3 million cases (including archives) from the MSEC, of which more than 44,000 are those that were to be considered by the MSEC in the first quarter of 2025. Accordingly, they will be considered by the expert teams. The process of entering these cases into the electronic system is currently underway. More than 22,000 cases have already been entered for priority consideration.
Regarding the passage of repeated examinations:
1) all who have restrictions on daily functioning, that is, legal grounds for disability status, will undergo assessment by an expert team of practicing physicians within the prescribed period;
2) if disability has been established indefinitely, assessment is not required, only at one's own request: all benefits, guarantees and payments remain in force;
3) if a person during 2022-2024 had to undergo a re-examination, but could not do so for valid reasons and in accordance with the exceptions provided for in the legislation during martial law, then it will have to be done:
- for men aged 25-60 with disability groups 2 or 3 - by November 1, 2025;
- for all other patients (except for the cases listed below) - by April 1, 2026.
Exceptions - inability to undergo a re-examination for the following reasons:
- people are in areas where hostilities are taking place or in temporarily occupied territories;
- patients with severe impairments of body functions (do not have a limb or one of the paired organs, do not hear or see, have cancer or mental illness);
- current servicemen of the Armed Forces of Ukraine and other military formations - for them, the disability status remains valid for the period of military service and for 60 days from the date of dismissal from service.
Will this affect the ability to receive a deferment from mobilization?
"All people who have a disability status continue to receive benefits, services, assistance and, in particular, a deferment from mobilization, on the basis of the conclusion of the MSEC during the term of its validity.
Exceptions are only illegal decisions on the establishment of disability, in respect of which criminal proceedings have been opened, evidence of illegality has been established, and court decisions are available", the Ministry of Health explained.
It should be added that more than 2,000 criminal proceedings on the questionable receipt of disability have been opened and already submitted for consideration to the Ministry of Health. The Ministry has already studied a thousand cases and canceled the status for 188 people.
In addition, the ministry emphasized that the information that all men with disabilities aged 25-60 must undergo a re-examination for the establishment of disability does not correspond to reality.
This category of people will undergo a re-examination only if they had to undergo it during 2022-2024, but could not do so for valid reasons and in accordance with the exceptions in the legislation during martial law.
Both the MSEC and the expert teams of practicing physicians who will replace them from January 1, 2025, establish or cancel disability solely on the basis of the grounds and criteria defined in the legislation.
