Monza Hospital embarks on strategic partnership with Ares Centers on cardiovascular diseases

Monza private hospital in Bucharest and ARES Excellence Centers announced on Wednesday they signed a strategic partnership that aims at extending the research and treatment in cardiology, with the best experts in the clinic cardiology teaming up to find the best cures for the patients with heart affections.

“We both put a premium on the patient, the patient is at the core of the multidisciplinary medical team’s concerns. The partnership comes following a major collaboration, with the doctors from ARES and those from Monza seldom sharing expertize to save the life of a patient, of a child. The partnership also comes from the need of innovating, of finding solutions. I believe that together we’ll be able to help more patients and we’ll represent liability one to another,” said Carmen Dragan, the president of Monza Hospital. She also announced that the hospital would also treat the emergency cases.

In his turn, Luca Militello, the general manager of the Monza hospital said that the “Policlinico di Monza”, the Italian group operating the Monza Hospital in Bucharest, is a strategic investor, which made the difference when treating the patient also from the social point of view.

“When the parents could not pay for their children’s surgeries, the foundations funded them. We have our own foundation that financed 40 heart surgeries on children last year. We also collaborate with “Save a Heart” foundation, which helped us operate another 20 children also last year,” Militello argued, adding that the international foundations also help them operate children not only from Romania, but also from abroad, from Kosovo or Albania, for instance.

Monza general manager complained about the state’s lack of involvement, arguing that many adults or children could be operated for much cheaper prices. “We can operate a heart case with EUR 5,000 for instance, while the cost mounts to EUR 20,000 abroad. The state pays 20% through the E112 form abroad instead of sending the cases here or at any other private hospital. When the state understands that it should also have to help the private centers develop in the patient’s interest it will be much better. But we are ready and have the necessary training anyway,” Luca Militello said, while revealing that the target for 2017 is to have over 4,000 patients in the interventional cardiology surgery and in the cardiovascular surgery.

Asked by The Romania Journal what is the percentage of the foreigners coming to Monza for treatment, interventions, Luca Militello said that 98% of their patients are Romanians, with the rest of 2 percent mostly representing the cases of the children brought from other countries to be operated by the hospital’s doctors.

“Our goal is to stop the migration of the Romanian  patients abroad”, also said Iulian Plescan, the operational manager of the ARES Centers.

Plescan informed that over 750,000 had been invested to perfect the partnership, which involved fully equipping the second angiography ward, expending the ambulatory capacity by six more surgeries and ten operational offices. “At the same time, we estimate a rise by 25% of the turnover, based on the multiplication of the procedures conducted following the partnership. In this respect, we foresee 1,500 endovascular procedures per year and 800 cardiovascular surgeries per year,” said Plescan.

“By the merger of the two structures, the patients’ medical path will be considerably simplified. At the moment, we can find the most experienced experts in Romania in the same place. Every pathology of the heart can be treated in one single place, both through surgical treatment or through minimally invasive surgical procedures, supported by cutting-edge medical equipment,” said Oren Iancovici, ARES general manager.

Following the partnership, the Monza Hospital will have a capacity of 140 beds, two angiography wards and 8 operating rooms, becoming the most performing cardiovascular center in Romania.