| Verified against primary record | |
| Most frequent country of treatment, authorised care (2023) | Czechia, with 580 cases[1] |
|---|---|
| Busiest authorisation flow into Czechia | From Slovakia[1] |
| Busiest reimbursement flows into Czechia | From Slovakia and from Poland[1] |
| National contact point | Kancelar zdravotniho pojisteni, a registered association in Prague[2] |
| Responsible public authority | Ministry of Health[2] |
| Contact point service | Free of charge, answered in about five working days on average[2] |
| Independently reported | |
| EU patients using the Directive each year | About 200,000, under 0.05 per cent of EU citizens[3] |
| Bands apply only to the rows beneath them. The 580 figure counts cases in which Czechia was the country where authorised treatment took place, as recorded across other member states’ returns, and it is not a Czech statistic or a total of all foreign patients treated in Czechia. Czechia’s own claim counts as a country of affiliation were not established for this article. No typical cost range is given because no official Czech source publishes prices paid by foreign patients. | |
Medical tourism in Czechia has a distinctive shape within the European Union: Czechia is the most frequent country in which authorised cross-border treatment actually takes place. On the Commission’s figures for reference year 2023, 580 cases of prior-authorised care were delivered in Czechia, the highest of any member state, and the busiest single authorisation flow in the Union was from Slovakia into Czechia. The flow is regional and historical rather than long-distance, and it is recorded in other countries’ returns rather than in a Czech count.
The leading destination for authorised care
For care requiring prior authorisation, the Commission identifies Czechia as the most frequent country of treatment in reference year 2023, with 580 cases, ahead of Germany at around 547. These are cases where a patient’s home state authorised treatment and the treatment was provided in Czechia.[1]
The direction of travel is strongly regional. The Commission names the movement from Slovakia to Czechia as the busiest prior authorisation flow in the Union, and names Slovakia and Poland to Czechia among the busiest reimbursement flows. It records more generally that patient mobility mostly involves neighbouring countries.[1]
The Slovak connection has an obvious explanation in shared language, a common medical tradition and a border, Czechia and Slovakia having formed a single state until 1993. Cross-border care of this kind is a continuation of existing referral patterns rather than a market created by promotion.
Two cautions attach to the 580 figure. It counts only care that required prior authorisation, which the European Court of Auditors found applies in around 1 per cent of cross-border cases, so it is a small and unrepresentative slice of total activity. And it is assembled from the returns of the countries whose patients travelled, so it tells us what other states recorded, not what Czech providers recorded.[3]
The Czech contact point
Czechia’s national contact point for cross-border healthcare is the Kancelar zdravotniho pojisteni, the Health Insurance Bureau, a registered association based in Prague, with the Ministry of Health identified as the responsible public authority.[2]
The service provides information on the possibility of using healthcare services elsewhere in the Union, the process for reimbursing costs, healthcare providers, and the contact details of national contact points in other member states. Contact is unrestricted and free of charge, enquiries are answered in about five working days on average, and replies are given primarily in Czech and English, with other EU languages possible but slower.[2]
The page describing the service publishes no statistics on cross-border patients, and it does not set out the Bureau’s statutory basis or describe it as a liaison body. The only quantity it gives is the average response time.[2]
The legal framework
Under Directive 2011/24/EU, the member state of affiliation must reimburse cross-border care where the treatment is among the benefits it covers domestically, capped at the level of costs it would have assumed and not exceeding the actual cost of the care received, with a discretion to pay more. Prior authorisation may be required only for care subject to planning requirements involving an overnight hospital stay or highly specialised and cost-intensive infrastructure, for treatments carrying a particular risk, and for care from providers raising serious quality or safety concerns.[5]
Because these duties fall on the state where the patient is insured, a country that mainly receives patients generates comparatively little of its own Directive data. That is the structural reason Czechia leads the destination table while its own claim counts are not the figures in question.[5]
The Commission also notes that a few countries still struggle to distinguish requests made under the social security coordination Regulations from requests made under the Directive, a caveat that applies across the collection and therefore to the flows into Czechia as well.[1]
What is not counted
Eurostat maintains a collection of hospital discharges of non-residents, with separate tables for in-patients, day cases, bed days and average length of stay, and its metadata, last updated on 15 December 2025, states that country of residence is reported for non-resident patients, while noting that some countries cannot supply it. Individual cell values for Czechia were not retrievable for this article.[4]
Nothing located here counts privately funded treatment of foreign patients in Czechia, which is the activity most commercial usage means by medical tourism and which has long included dentistry and elective surgery for patients from western Europe. No official Czech figure for it was found, and none has been estimated.
Limits of the evidence
Czechia’s leading position in the destination table rests on a single figure covering a narrow category of care, drawn from other states’ returns, in a collection whose compiler warns that some countries conflate two legal routes. Czechia’s own return as a country of affiliation was not examined for this article, so no statement is made here about Czech patients travelling abroad. The contact point description comes from a government business portal page last checked in January 2025 rather than from the Bureau’s own statute, and that page explicitly lacks the Bureau’s statutory basis.
See also
- Destination markets in medical tourism, the role Czechia occupies in the European data
- Cross-border healthcare for border communities, which the Slovak and Polish flows largely reflect
- Language affinity and medical tourism, a plain factor in the Slovak flow
- Dental tourism, a long-standing privately funded flow into the region
- Medical tourism in Germany, the other leading country of treatment on the same measure
References
- European Commission, Directorate-General for Health and Food Safety. Data on cross-border patient healthcare following Directive 2011/24/EU, reference year 2023. 15 May 2025. Verified against primary record: the report was opened and the identification of Czechia as the most frequent country of treatment for prior-authorised care with 580 cases, the German comparator figure, the naming of the Slovakia to Czechia authorisation flow as the busiest in the Union, the naming of the Slovakia and Poland to Czechia reimbursement flows, the statement that mobility mostly involves neighbouring countries, and the caveat that some countries conflate the Directive with the coordination Regulations were read directly. Retrieved 23 October 2026.
- Czech Ministry of Health, via the government business information portal. Kancelar zdravotniho pojisteni, cross-border healthcare contact point. Page last checked 2 January 2025. Verified against primary record: the page was opened and the identity and Prague location of the Health Insurance Bureau as a registered association, the Ministry of Health as responsible public authority, the scope of information provided, the free and unrestricted access, the average five working day response time, the languages of reply, and the absence of any published statistics or statutory basis were read directly. Retrieved 23 October 2026.
- European Court of Auditors. Special Report 07/2019: EU actions for cross-border healthcare. 2019. Verified against primary record: the report was opened and the annual patient estimate, the share of citizens, and the finding that prior authorisation applies in around 1 per cent of cases were read. Retrieved 23 October 2026.
- Eurostat. Hospital discharges and length of stay for inpatient and curative care (hlth_hosd), reference metadata. Last updated 15 December 2025. Verified against primary record: the metadata page was opened and the non-resident definition, the statement that country of residence is reported, the caveat about countries unable to supply it, and the list of non-resident tables were read. Retrieved 23 October 2026.
- European Parliament and Council. Directive 2011/24/EU, Chapter III, Articles 7 and 8. 9 March 2011. Verified against primary record: the chapter text was opened and the reimbursement rule in Article 7, its addressing of the member state of affiliation, and the three permitted grounds for prior authorisation in Article 8(2) were read. Retrieved 23 October 2026.
Sourcing note: this entry uses only official sources. The 580 figure is presented as what it is, a count of authorised treatments delivered in Czechia assembled from other member states’ returns, and not as a Czech statistic or as a total of foreign patients treated in the country. No claim is made about Czech patients travelling abroad, because Czechia’s own return as a country of affiliation was not examined. No figure has been estimated for privately funded treatment of foreign patients.