The Impact of the European Court of Justice Case Law on National Systems for Cross-Border Health Service Provision

Estudio 15-01-2007

Executive summary Cross-border health care is an issue of growing importance in the European Union. This briefing note provides information on the structure of health care systems with respect to cross-border health care in selected Member States. It examines to what extent rulings from the European Court of Justice (ECJ) have caused Member States to make legislative or administrative changes, and the challenges that have been experienced in this regard. Although patient mobility has increased, the current volume of patient mobility seems to be relatively low (around 1% of overall public expenditure on healthcare). Cross-border challenges predominantly concern planned healthcare as opposed to other forms of care. For planned care, the key challenge is the nature of the authorisation procedures which remain in place as a way of protecting national systems. The terms and application of the authorisation scheme are the central subject matter for the ECJ judgments. [...]