The fee will affect patients who are absent from a booked time at, among other things, a health center, general practitioner, specialist physician or planned surgery without valid reason. Something that the region considers necessary as more and more patients are missing from their booked times.

Half a million patients were absent

In 2018, almost 22 million health visits were made in the Stockholm region. Of these, 514,000 visits were canceled because the patient did not show up or cancel late. This is an increase of eight percent since 2015 and is identified as a contributing cause for the growth of care queues.

According to the region, the missed visits cost an average of more than one thousand SEK per visit.

An increased fee can be introduced in the spring

Today, healthcare providers in the county can charge a fee corresponding to the patient fee, if they do not visit. But not all caregivers do. For example, hospitals do not charge a fee if patients do not show up for outpatient surgery.

The new fee should be equal for all, except for patients in the psychiatric care, where there may be obvious reasons why patients are absent.

A final decision on increased fees will be made by the regional council in March and may be introduced no earlier than 1 May. The amount of money the new fee will generate has not been calculated by the health care administration.