OK, so I have mentioned health care in my other blog posts, but today I would like us to dig deeper into health and senior care in Crete. I actually got a comment from one of my readers on one of those blog posts who was not very impressed by my post, and called my post “superficial” Well, when it comes to blog posts, there is always the main subject of the post and the article was not about health care at all.

So I hope you will be impressed by this post because this one is about health and senior care in Crete so I will try to give as much information as I can. OK so Let’s jump right into it. We are going to start with the health system in Crete and Greece at large. WHO( World Health Organization) at some point ranked the Greek health system as one of the best in the world.

That being said, we must keep in mind that the effects of the economic crisis that hit Greece back I’m 2009 is still being felt, and that means although Crete and Greece at large have fantastic medical facilities with highly qualified doctors, most of the Public hospitals are underfunded. And that means, if you are living in Crete on your own and need to be admitted to a public hospital, you will need to have someone to assist you because Nurses in public hospitals don’t perform duties like bedpan assistance or emptying bags.

Theirs is to administer medication. The duty of assisting the patient with other things is left to the family members, also when it comes to feeding the patient, the family is to take care of that too. The family members are expected to bring with them things like food and water, soap, washing cloth, a basin, and other necessities to facilitate the hygiene of the patient.

Health And Senior Care In Crete, How Can One Survive If They Are Living On Their Own?

I know now you, are probably wondering how you would cope if you were to move to Crete on your own as a senior. Actually, you can do it that’s if you have the funds to hire a personal caregiver through private companies like Care In Crete. Based on their website, they can provide not only general care but someone who will take up the part of the family member in case you end up in the hospital. They also say that they can provide transport to and from the hospital and a translator who will speak to the doctors and ask questions on your behalf.

Before I go too far with this, I must disclose that it’s been my experience that sometimes a company’s website will sound very professional and very reassuring but when it really comes down to it, things on the ground are different. Personally, I have not dealt directly with Care In Crete but I can say that a friend of ours was actually trying to get them to arrange for a private nurse to administer medication and perform other Nursing duties at home, but because they wanted the private nurse urgently, they found it too complicated to arrange.

I Don’t Like It When The Prices Are Not Listed

May I also mention that when I visited their website, they don’t list prices for the services they provide and that to me is a red flag because how do I know that I am not gonna be charged more than the next client? Here in Crete, it’s very common for people to be charged different prices depending on who they are.

Now going back to Our friend, he had fallen and broken his hip, he was able to be treated at the general hospital of Chania. He stayed there for a while and the wife needed assistance, both while in Hospital, and during the recovery time at home. When he was discharged from the hospital. They had to hire a taxi ambulance to be taking him back to the hospital for duties that they felt could be easily performed at home by a nurse, so their plan was to hire a nurse, and then only go to the hospital when they had to go and see the doctor for the check-ups.

Well, that didn’t work out so they still had to keep hiring the taxi ambulance which according to them is quite costly.

I Think Crete And Greece At Large Needs More Qualified Nurses

Currently, there is a shortage of nurses everywhere but Greece seems to be in desperate need of trained nurses, according to our friends, the Chania Genera Hospital, has very few nurses. What they have are what they call technicians who are in charge of duties like drawing blood, for lab testing, and administering medication, but not nursing services.

So as I mentioned earlier taking care of the patient, in terms of bathing, feeding, and other assistance is left for the family members.

Hospitals And Health Insurance In Crete

Crete as I mentioned in my previous posts has high standard medical facilities with major cities on the island like Chania, Rethymnon, and Heraklion having large well-equipped medical facilities. Emergency services are offered free of charge in public hospitals. There are also public and private outpatient health clinics all over the island. We also talked about pharmacies, one of the things that amazed me when I first moved to Crete, was the number of pharmacies on the island.

When it comes to health insurance, for those moving to Crete to work here, if you will be paying into the Greek social security, then you maybe be entitled to healthcare and dental care coverage as long as you get treated at IKA affiliated facilities. For EU Citizens, it’s possible to tie your national health insurance into the Greek IKA, that’s what my husband has done, he pays into his Danish National Health Insurance, and then when we need treatment, it works out that the Greek IKA claims from the Danish one.

When I spoke to my friends who are from the UK, about how the husband managed insurance-wise, after the accident, they said that somehow it worked out the same as we do, all the hospital asked for was the AMKA number(this is a social security number) and all was taken care of, our friends are under the UK’s NHS. When it comes to private health insurance, as we know it is quite expensive but if you can’t be able to sort things out between Greece and your country, then you will definitely need private Health insurance.

Health And Senior Care In Crete Nursing Homes In Crete

Well, based on a report posted on Chania Post on the 11th of February 2022, some nursing homes on the island are not so good. There is a nursing home that was shut down and its management was put under arrest for mistreatment of seniors that led to some losing their lives, you can read the full report here. I found the report when I was doing my research on nursing homes in Crete, and it scared me.

After talking to a few friends of ours we came to a conclusion that ending up in a nursing home in Crete, as a foreigner who maybe doesn’t have any family members on the island is not a very good idea. In my opinion, the island could use high-standard nursing homes. The nursing home mentioned in the report above was charging 700 to 1200 euros a month per resident, and allegedly they only allocated 0.55 Eur per day for care and food.

So the residents were left to be without baths and even food for long periods of time. But that is an isolated case, so I am not implying that all senior care facilities in Crete are like that, but it does scare us and some of our friends when we read that report.

Conclusion

a lot of people are looking to retire in Crete, and When it comes to medical treatment, Crete in my opinion is excellent, and the fact that you can see a specialist without having to wait for a long time is definitely a plus because we have friends in the UK who have been waiting for months to see specialists.

Now let me answer this question before I end the post, Do I have to register with a GP when I move to Crete? Not necessarily, you can just go to the nearest clinic even if you are not registered and you will be treated or referred to a specialist, the GP we’ve been seeing since I have been here in Crete (7 years) we are not registered with him per say but he is our GP, that’s where we go.

Well, I sure hope this post was helpful, if so why not leave me a comment? It really helps my post to be pushed up by Google so more people can read it.

Thank you so much for your time.

Rose.

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