February the 28th, 2023 - The Croatian healthcare system saved my life. This isn't an understatement. 

Back in 2006 when I went into anaphylactic shock in Zagreb due to allergies I was unaware I had, hitna pomoć (the emergency services) arriving when they did and not a minute later meant that I could keep breathing and can now sit and write about it. I depend on HZZO (the Croatian Health Insurance Fund) for access to my medication, I’ve had four surgeries, and countless tests and consultations have taken place in between. I joke that having to juggle several chronic conditions has turned me into a professional patient. 

Over the past 18 months, besides my GP and dentist, I needed to see a gynaecologist, a urologist, a gastroenterologist, a pulmonologist, an otorhinolaryngologist, a psychiatrist, a neurologist and an anaesthesiologist.  It was a particularly tough time in which my body decided to just go into self-destruct mode. I got through it, but came out with my eyes more open than ever before having witnessed how devastating relying on a system that is so wrongly neglected can be.

General practitioners - a journey that began 19 years ago

I took my first GP for granted. I remember how my allergies were the first thing listed on my “karton” (medical file) in capital letters and highlighted so that nobody could get it wrong. She was considerate and noticed symptoms I didn’t even complain about. I was safe with her. Later she retired and I moved away from Zagreb.

My second GP was a different story. She’d prescribe me medication during consultations and then pause to ask me, “What are you allergic to again?” This made me worry enough to check the ingredients on all prescribed medication before taking anything. Once she prescribed a pill which those suffering from asthma were (strongly) advised not to take. The second time she gave me a tablet which she reassured me didn't contain any ingredients I was allergic to. I went home, I took it, then minutes later my eyes started burning and my airways tightened up. It wasn't bad enough to go to make me go to the emergency room, but I did make a firm decision to change my GP after that. My criterion wasn’t to find a doctor who cares, only one who wouldn't accidentally kill me.

Good GPs are hard to come by. If you're lucky enough to land one, you should expect that you'll end up needing to wait a while for consultations and they will be hard to get a hold of via phone. If you have time, it’s okay. Otherwise, people save themselves the frustration by opting for ''okay enough'' doctors or simply paying out of pocket.

The deeper you dive, the murkier the water gets...

It may all look great if you’re generally healthy and only need a doctor for the occasional infection or unfortunate accident. I’ve read accounts from foreigners needing to go to the emergency services at the hospital and coming out praising the treatment they receive. Yeah, but… Go there three or four times, hand the technicians at the porta a local name, then sit and wait, and boy will you wait.

I once sat at the ER for hours whilst an older woman kept screaming in complete anguish on the other side of the door. “Ajmeeeee! Ajmeeee! Ajmeee!” (“Ajme!” means “Oh my!”) I couldn’t see her nor in any way know what the problem was, but her pain reverberated through all of us sitting there in the waiting room. We could hear and occasionally see medical personal shuffling around her but clearly nobody was offering this woman comfort. Instead, business went on as usual. After a day spent at the hospital, doing a run around and some tests, I got up and left before I saw a doctor. The psychological strain of hearing that poor woman scream for hours on end was more painful than the physical pain and distress I was feeling. “I’d rather die at home than be here,” I thought. 

I’ve had a dental technician dig in my mouth without gloves for an x-ray. A filling gone wrong resulted in the loss of a tooth...

Last year I went to see a specialist, the head of his department. I entered while he was on his mobile phone in a private conversation. I sat in front of him for fifteen minutes, without him even acknowledging my presence with so much as a gesture for me to wait, before he decided to start the consultation.

A routine gynaecological exam

Gynaecological exams are uncomfortable at best. You just want it over with. I once arrived for an appointment to find that my regular doctor wasn't there and the nurse proceeded to tell me that she was not returning. There was a substitute doctor in her place (most of my unexpected bad visits happened with subs I didn’t plan to see).

I went into my usual routine of undressing, getting into position, closing my eyes and waiting for it to be over. I noticed that it was strangely painful for a routine check-up (the most painful thus far) so I looked down. I was horrified that this man was “down there” and not wearing a mask. This was in the middle of the pandemic when we were still wearing masks everywhere and not just at the clinic. He didn’t give me any feedback so I waited and then asked him if everything was okay. Affirmative. We spoke about medications and I explained my allergies to him. This part was the cherry on top: He prescribed a medication with an ingredient I am allergic to.

I hear more and more women say they go to private gynaecologists following bad experiences in the system.

The coronavirus crisis

Both my husband and I are asthmatic. When asthmatics were included on the government list of high risk patients to be among the first to receive COVID-19 vaccines, I called to place us on the list.

“Where do you live?” The operator asked.

“Janjina.”

“Okay. We’ll notify you when the vaccine becomes available to you.”

Weeks passed and I heard about other chronically unwell patients already receiving their booster shots in other parts of the country. Could it be where we live?

As it turned out, yes. We were listed in the system as residents of our village and would therefore be notified when the vaccines would become available here. Before that happened we contracted COVID-19 and developed a more severe clinical picture which almost landed me in the hospital and took months for both of us to recover from. Had somebody told me to ask to be listed under ''Dubrovnik'' and we would have made it onto the list and simply taken a 1.5 hour drive for our vaccines. I don’t blame the operator. I blame an ineffective system.

Finding a good doctor

Najdoktor.com features doctors with ratings and reviews by patients. It has become my first step in finding new doctors. I won’t accept a rating of less than four stars, and only due to waiting times and personnel, otherwise I want five stars. Anything below that and you’re taking a risk. Unfortunately not all doctors are listed, especially those in rural areas and smaller towns and cities.

The current situation is an unfortunate side effect of Croatia’s brain drain. When I'm lucky enough to get to a very good doctor and they’re still young, panic sets in as I wonder if they’ll decide to go work abroad at some point. If they’re reaching retirement age I panic because I know how difficult they'll be to replace. Our choice, especially in rural areas, is not between good, okay and bad doctors; it is sometimes only between bad doctors who will mostly make okay decisions and no doctor at all. The reality is that okay decisions still save lives (let’s not talk about the bad ones).

Money keeps you alive and where you live matters

I used to be able to depend on the Croatian healthcare system for all my healthcare needs. This has become impossible, so now I’ve switched to a system of prioritising. If it’s high on the priority list, I'll pay. If it’s not so urgent then I'll wait my turn in the system. It’s a juggle in which every element is crucial because I couldn’t possibly pay for everything out of pocket.

I was extremely reluctant to start paying for anything because I was unwilling to let go of the ideal that healthcare is a human right afforded to all citizens. For years I believed that ideal to be a reality in Croatia because I lived it. In most cases I’m paying for speed and not better care. Many of the doctors who work privately come from the public sector so you won’t be seeing a better doctor; just you’ll get to see them sooner.

Your options if you require a brain MRI, for example, are to either wait ten months (or four months if your doctor says it’s urgent) or get it done the next day if you’re willing to pay 240 euros privately. It could be devastating if you don’t have the months or the euros at hand.

I also find that people are making more and more trips to Zagreb. There is a bigger pool of doctors and hospitals, making it much easier to get what you need. The other thing that helps, as with all things in this place, is “veze”, otherwise known as connections. If you know the right person you can get to what you need sooner without paying.

In an ideal world

I’d like doctors to look me in the eyes when they meet and examine me, not stare straight at the screen and start typing as I speak. I’d like more authentic listening and practical solutions and fewer prescriptions. I’d like to leave the hospital feeling like a recognised human being and not one of thousands that nobody noticed. Unrealistic? I don’t think so. But it may be a thing of the past.

I get that doctors have to switch off to stay sane. If they were to invest emotions into every patient they wouldn’t make it or be able to work. It makes sense. However, I feel that a system that is increasingly forcing people to switch off is a clear sign that it is broken for them too.

Where are we headed?

The Croatian healthcare system as it is creates an unhealthy environment for patients, doctors and all personnel.  Healthcare workers are primarily accountable to the system that employs them, leaving us all to have to navigate through its obscure web to get anything done. We need healthcare practitioners to be accountable to us first, the patients whose wellbeing is in their hands.

The problem has been present in the media for years. I’ve been following it in the Dubrovnik region in particular. I always find it funny that reporters mostly interview senior citizens when they pose questions to the public about healthcare. Baka or djed (grandmother or grandfather) will tell you that doctors are not as good today as they used to be and we have a big problem. We nod our heads and perhaps even roll our eyes because they say that about everything. For as long as you're healthy, this is probably a normal reaction. As a “young” person struggling through this system I want to point out that they are not exaggerating and the stories I hear from other chronically ill patients confirm my worries.

I don’t know if it’s going to get better. The way I see it is that if you want the equivalent quality of care compared to what you could get in this country ten to fifteen years ago through state-funded health insurance, then you'll have to pay for it today. Medical tourism will likely fuel this as more foreigners will be willing to pay what for them is a low rate and good doctors will be incentivised to leave the public sector.

Nevertheless, having the good doctors remain in Croatia although in the private sector is better than losing them altogether to emigration. I hope we can save this system and fix the cracks; otherwise Croatia will increasingly become a place where a person’s paycheque dictates their access to healthcare.

For more, check out our lifestyle section.

January 11, 2023 - Incredible success of Croatian doctors from KBC Zagreb - a few days ago, they transplanted a man's heart and liver simultaneously.

As Index writes, Hrvoje Gašparović, head of the Clinic for Cardiac Surgery at KBC Zagreb, commented on the venture for Nova TV. More than 30 people participated in the operation, and the patient is recovering very well.

"Heart transplantation, liver transplantation, in fact, transplantation of all solid organs, is always a race against time. There is a rigid time frame within which the transplantation procedure must be started and completed. When we disconnect the heart from circulation, we usually disconnect it in another country so that we would re-incorporate it into circulation in the Republic of Croatia. We want to do that within four hours. Sometimes we lose more than two hours just for transportation," explained Gašparović.

A complex operation

He pointed out that it is a complex procedure in which four surgical teams participate, which must be carefully coordinated to perform the transplant in the correct sequence.

"The heart transplant happens first, after which the colleagues from abdominal surgery continued the operation and successfully performed their part of the liver transplant," Gašparović pointed out.

Professor Gašparović's team transplanted lungs to a child for the first time in Croatia. "Lung transplantation is a program that has been stable for the past few years," he said, adding that the child received the lungs of an adult.

106 transplants last year

He pointed out that a total of 106 solid organ transplants were performed last year - 27 heart transplants, 26 liver transplants, 43 kidney transplants, and 10 lung transplants.

"It is a comprehensive transplant program that we can be proud of. Transplantation of solid organs in this country is the backbone of our medicine. Hats off to everyone participating, including our transplant coordinators from the Ministry. It is difficult to count all the people who participate in this process", he concluded.

"Regarding the transplantation of solid organs, especially hearts, we are extremely good at the global level. For example, everyone remembers that in 2018 Croatia beat England 2:1, but not many people know that Croatia beat that same England, and Germany too, 9:3 in the number of transplants we do per million inhabitants. Therefore, we have nothing to be ashamed of," said Gašparović.

For more, make sure to check out our dedicated Lifestyle section.

November 1, 2022 - Starting next school year, screening first graders for familial hypercholesterolemia will be introduced, and Croatia will be among the first countries with such screening, which exposes the increased cardiovascular risk for children, as well as their closest relatives.

As reported by Index, the president of the Croatian Cardiology Society, explained: "One more test will be added to the systematic examination for enrollment in the first grade of primary school, and that is the total value of cholesterol in the blood." Hereditary, so-called familial hypercholesterolemia implies exposure to pathologically high concentrations of atherogenic cholesterol from early childhood. Therefore patients with this metabolic disease have a tenfold more significant risk of premature cardiovascular incidents.

20,000 people affected

It is estimated that around twenty thousand people in Croatia suffer from such a disorder of fat metabolism, and only one percent of them are recognised. Screening of children was supposed to start this school year, but due to technical reasons, it was postponed until the next school year.

If elevated cholesterol is found, the child will be referred to a pediatrician, and therapy will begin if the diagnosis is confirmed. Treatment is most effective if it starts as early as possible so that patients can have the same number of healthy years and life expectancy as those without the disease.

People suffering from untreated hereditary hypercholesterolemia often suffer from a heart attack or stroke between the ages of 35 and 45 and therefore live significantly shorter lives than the average population.

This concerns patients with the so-called heterozygous form of the disease, which occurs in about 1:300 people. A much rarer and much more malignant is the so-called homozygous hypercholesterolemia, in which, without treatment, patients fall ill and die as a result of atherosclerosis as early as adolescence. When a diagnosis is made during the systematic examination of a preschool child, the school medicine doctor will inform the family doctor about it. They will then perform the so-called reverse cascade screening, i.e., investigate the existence of familial hypercholesterolemia in the affected child's parents, brothers, sisters, or closest relatives.

A parent is a transmitter

Such screening can save the child's parents, one of whom is undoubtedly a carrier of this disease and at the same time suffers from, most often unrecognised, familial hypercholesterolemia. Detecting and treating sick parents and other close relatives, treatment will begin and thus prevent or delay the most dangerous complications of advanced atherosclerosis.

Miličić points out that this is a very important national project that will improve the cardiovascular health of many families and save many lives in the foreseeable future. Given that an average of 30,000 children are enrolled in the first grade of primary school, it is expected that a hundred children in one generation could be diagnosed with this disorder.

Miličić announced the introduction of the new screening at last week's symposium in Zagreb, organised by the World Federation of Cardiology and the Croatian Society of Cardiology. The seminar gathered leading domestic cardiologists who, just after the world premiere, got acquainted with the new procedure for controlling elevated cholesterol.

Other important topics were also touched upon, such as reducing the intake of table salt, the obesity pandemic, and diabetes. It was pointed out that Croats are currently the fattest European nation, and obesity represents a significant independent risk for cardiovascular diseases and many others.

Miličić asserted that Croatia, with a share of cardiovascular mortality of 37 percent in total mortality, with more than 22,000 deaths from these diseases per year, still belongs to countries with a high cardiovascular risk in Europe.

For more, make sure to check out our dedicated Lifestyle section.

December the 30th, 2021 - The Croatian public health system is faced with a lot of criticism, much of it is unfounded, here's my story.

Last spring was promising me yet another wonderful, very long, carefree and rejuvenating time down by the sea. Retirement is a blessing. It offers freedom of movement (plus freedom of speech if you enjoy it properly) and, especially, total command over one’s time. That's the bright side of it.

Time is man’s only true possession - everything else is precarious, ephemeral, temporary or illusional, much like our own bodies and physical states, for example. They're precarious, ephemeral, temporary, limited, and certainly not a supporting companion to our soul. I think that babies start crying seconds after their birth not because they are terrified by the new environment, but because they experience physical pain. Pain is man’s first experience of the world. Our body is not our friend, and it is less and less so as time goes by.

Health of course is tied to what one does on a daily basis to try to preserve it. Some attempts are futile, most aren't. Some people understand that early on, most don't.

I'm proud to say that my life allowed me to sin for a major part. A lot. Heaps more than most people I guess. I have seen more dawns than twilights, so to speak. Because life in general was generous to me (well, even during the war it was rewarding in many ways when I think of it), serenity prevailed by far over all of my days. When you're young, you are supposed to be all kinds of things when you grow up and you can of course do anything, including becoming an ''adult'' while still underage, because you need to keep up with the boys from your quarter, all of whom are your seniors by quite some years.

You cannot afford to be called a sissy if you didn't smoke, which you would be. At least back then. So I started smoking when I had barely reached the ''ripe old age'' of 16, when of course I knew everything there was to know about life, as did you, I'm sure. Later on, in the long years of studying and then freelancing around the world, partying and booze came into the picture, too, inevitably. Not that I'd get wasted every night, of course, but, well, there was lots of partying and many dawns, and many an estranged taxi taking me to where my bed was while missing my sunglasses and a bottle of water most desperately.

I remember discovering ''The Memories of Hadrian'' somewhere in my early twenties and re-reading that book several times over. Among quite a few memorable points, despite myself being young and utterly healthy, my mind recorded that moment when Hadrian started to become tired of his body which was becoming a nuisance, a traitor, limiting and disabling him. Almost one half of a century later, Hadrian has come to my mind so many, many a time. What a piece of work is man, Master Shakespeare wondered. Indeed.

When you think how you hated your granny (and your mother, and aunt and practically every adult around) who scorned you for not wearing a sweater, not having your shirt tucked in properly, sitting on cold concrete that would certainly make your kidneys ''go bad'', for going out (on a date possibly) with your hair still wet from the shower as a safe way of getting meningitis and inflamed sinuses, not to talk about lessons on how bad smoking is for you and how alcohol damages your liver… But who would listen? All of those irritating pontifications might have been true, but they had nothing to do with you whatsoever in your mind.

And then, how many times have you heard that somebody died of ''a sudden heart attack''? Sudden!?  It took almost all my life so far for me to learn that there is no such thing as a sudden heart attack. Such events, rare as they are, are freak ones. Every stroke or heart attack has its silent and deadly history built up in the years, it has its progress and, especially its cause(s) that live with you for a long time before that. You pay no attention, and then you're suddenly being transported to an emergency ward. Genetics play a role of course, but the cause is - you. Or, in my case - me. Also because my granny got on my nerves so much. 

The experience I had was more than terrible, and I want to share some of it.

I was in London some eight years ago when the very first rays of warning shone up inside my brain. One day I was walking from an underground station to the house of my friends where I stayed. It was an everyday routine, nothing special, and quite a short distance too. I might have been less than 100 metres from the house when I felt my right calf suddenly become stiff, further steps were oddly difficult, I started limping and hardly made it to the gate. The remaining several days were highly marked by that. I had pains when walking, I could not walk for long, either. It was sudden. It was frightening. That is when I was reminded of the not-so-good genetics pertaining to arteries in my family. There I was. It has caught up with me despite my lack of attention. I should have listened.

Back in Zagreb I hardly made it upstairs, dragging a suitcase along with me to my apartment at the same time. All alarms then began ringing inside me. This was no pulled muscle, and no self-resolving, passing ailment. One or two calls to my friends sent me to a hospital right away. There was a clog in my artery that had stopped the flow of blood to my leg almost completely and the operation, performed under local anaesthesia, was carried out by a young doctor who I made laugh heartily while he dealt with the clog.

When you must not move an eyelash for almost two hours, it feels much longer than it is.  I was alone in a spacious room, I had a TV, my own internet and actually had a good time within the circumstances, however ''disturbed'' by frequent check-ups and controls by medics. The care was total and complete and made me feel safe and comfortable. It was proof that the Croatian public health system, while underfunded, was beyond excellent.

This happened somewhere exactly around Easter Day and I was glad I could avoid traditional lunches and coloured eggs. That’s for kids, I find. Five days later I was back in the normal world with a clean artery and feeling quite good, quite normal again. I avoided driving and public transportation and walked everywhere I could. That is how you control cardiovascular diseases which only require conservative treatment. I soon forgot about that.

Pain gone and experience fading, I soon regained my old lifestyle. A thousand parties and no work, as Gertrude Stein defined the Thirties in Paris. Well, almost. Freelancing allows for that, as anyone who has dabbled in that knows well.

As a heavily addicted smoker, I wasn't aware of what I was silently but lethally doing to myself. Friends and family would warn and rebuke me, some strongly. I continued believing that the slogans on tobacco packages about death, cancer and other pretty things could not possibly affect me. Larger than life I was. Isn't cognitive dissonance a strange thing?

I could not bring to my awareness that getting out from a warm restaurant into freezing rain just to have a smoke made my granny turn in her grave while my arteries were getting more and more clogged by the day, by every single puff on a cigarette, by every single drag. My life was so good again, so why should I listen?

Some years went by, the uneasy feeling in my legs was growing once again, slowly but constantly, until I reached the stage when I could barely make a distance of 50 metres and was in almost constant discomfort. My calf writhing with each step as my body desperately tried to transport adequate oxygenated blood. In vain.  

It was a wonderful evening with a gang of friends of an international composition, with so much fun, laughter, totally uninhibited by ''Weltschmerz'' and the futility of life. When we had to change the place because of a rapidly approaching closing time, I realised I would hardly make it on foot.  The other place was less than 200 metres away. The final alarm was on. Again.

One call to a doctor friend put me in hospital almost the same day. During the first check-ups it seemed it was to be an easy intervention, then they took some blood, did some tests and found out that my blood sugar was above 20. It was too dangerous to operate. I was diabetic too, apparently. I had no idea what my body was suffering from, how could I have been so detached? How dare I feel surprised by my neglect? It was almost one week before they managed to bring it down to an operable stage.

I had peripheral arterial disease. An incurable but controllable arterial disease which affects the limbs, mainly the legs. My femoral artery was entirely clogged, and so were some others. Well, there we go. Another operation, a big one this time, with general anaesthetic and consent forms galore. I woke up after some hours, the doctors couldn't believe how brilliant my readings suddenly were, how my body which obviously was in dire need bounced straight back after being given what it needed. Instead of a longer sojourn in intensive care, I was taken quite quickly back to my room to recover. Yet again, more very good care at the hospital, another operation gone well, expertly well. It made me think of all those accolades Croatian medicine has been getting from all over the world. It is very deserved. Take it from me.

A few more years passed by. My left leg still had a few problems, some due to nerve damage following surgery, but it was truly nothing in comparison to how I felt before that last operation. I got used to stopping when I walked, waiting for a minute or two when I experienced claudication, and continuing. Naturally, I didn't feel enthusiastic about walking at all. My legs felt heavy and not willing to be exposed to any strain. Because of the pain it caused, although that pain was actually my saviour which would help to treat my disease, I started avoiding going anywhere on foot.

Unlike that first time, the famous blue Zagreb trams became my favourite way of moving around the city, and driving too. Then, my doctor scolded me, telling me that I must walk, walk and walk some more. By walking and straining the legs, you help your body develop more collateral blood paths, you help your heart, you help your - everything. I did reduce my nicotine intake, with lots of effort and self-control, but I could not abandon it altogether. By the way, for all you dirty smokers out there - I reduced the number of cigarettes by allowing myself to smoke only on the terrace, outside, never  inside the house. It helped. Maybe you could try that, too. It was quite an achievement for me who once smoked 40 per day, but I still couldn't quite kick it to the curb. Idiotic, I know.

My close friend, Lauren, started to force me to walk. We'd take long walks, not just to a cafe. She would get me to do it daily, again and again. I felt better. The splendid Maksimir Park offers infinite combinations and paths to stroll, for as long as you can or want to. I was forced to make at least 6000 - 7000 steps each time. For orientation, I could make some 200 in one go. Imagine the effort! I had to stop many times, but I did it. Never without losing my breath, panting or anything, never feeling that my heart was suffering. But to tell the truth, my physical condition was not exceedingly good. To put it modestly.

Fast-foward to April 2021. The leaves on the trees were turning green, everything was in blossom, Maksimir Park looks truly fabulous at that time of year, permeated with the birds’ twitter and the gentle breeze in the thick tree tops. As nice as all that is, as a Dalmatian from Dubrovnik, I was craving the sea. Addicted to the sea and, especially, to swimming - at least for 6 months a year, usually - I started coining my plan to go to the coast much earlier than usual and to make the ''summer'' a very long one indeed. I decided to have myself checked properly, to be sure I could spend several months in a village, far from my doctor friends in case, God forbid, I needed one. 

I contacted my friend, a renowned vascular surgeon from Zagreb, and asked him if he would be willing to check me up ''properly'', with scans and the works, as I really wanted to know what was going on inside me, especially inside my arteries. At one of those check-ups, I ''demanded'' that he check my heart. Without any apparent sign of anything. I just wanted to be sure. It might have been genetic hint from some of my ancestors from ''up there''. I had no cardiac symptoms that I could discern, it just came out of the blue.

How unfortunately right I was! My blood pressure was through the roof. I was suffering from hypertension which is high blood pressure, a common condition in which the long-term force of the blood against your artery walls is high enough that it may eventually cause heart disease. The ultrasound not only found some other little flaws in my heart, but three main arteries were more or less clogged. I needed a triple coronary bypass in an emergency procedure. I was ordered to stay in the hospital that same moment. In other words, I had to be under permanent custody, linked up to various monitors, as my heart could collapse under the strain at any moment. How and why I had not had a massive heart attack during those thousands of steps in Maksimir Park will remain a secret forever. A miracle, in fact, as told to me by my doctor.

An important reminder: there are very, very few sudden heart attacks. They only hit suddenly, when the silently struggling heart can no longer cope.

I did not have a heart attack, as the intervention occurred just before the inevitable happened, and I did not fear one. I told myself I should have that operation as soon as possible in order to be able to - go to the sea. Baby steps.

I spent two weeks in an utterly nice, freshly renovated ward, feeling alright under the constant telemetric control. I became used to the idea that I must remember the cables attached to me round the clock. To me, there were no signs or signals that my heart was penting up to provide enough oxygenated blood to the rest of me. Once again, to praise the Croatian public health system, it is so good when there is a bunch of communicative doctors and, especially, nurses with who you can share a laugh or two. 

I loved the sliding doors that saved everybody from being woken up by doors slamming somewhere down the corridor. I ignored the fact that I was confined, in detention, it was for my sake and for my good. I also ignored the fact that the pandemic and the inability to have visitors made this period of isolation more conspicuous, in some cases even very cruel. I had all the care I needed, my doctor friend (from another ward) would visit sometimes bringing with him absolute confidence and peace to my soul.

Tests, scans, readings, as the big day arrived. Taken by an ambulance to the central hospital to be operated on, an efficient nurse accompanied me to my new room and a new roommate, and luckily a very funny one. Sarcasm is one of my favourite assistants. New doctors, kind and caring nurses. Preparations for the operation, some not pleasant at all, but all done with patience and total care. The Croatian public health system succeeded very well in making me feel safe, despite all the huge question marks and worries hovering in the air and above my own head. 

The surgery was done. I woke up feeling that I was tied to a bed in an unknown space. It was so dark, just one lamp offered a slip of light somewhere in the distance, at some corner or something, my anaesthetic-induced blurry vision and confusion limited my understanding of my surroundings. My throat felt as if it had been cleaned out by a bit of aged sandpaper. I needed water. I tried to yell, but I produced no sound. I realised I was still intubated. I was helpless. I needed water. There was an attentive nurse on the sentinel who discerned my growling sounds in the dark. It wasn't just water this time, it was the blessing of all the Gods that ever existed to me at that moment. Sleep. More water. Several rounds, a few tests. After some indefinite time, they rolled me back to my room. 

The time of colliding with reality, with the seriousness of my body, had come to me. Thank you, Hadrian, you were so right and I hope you were not this sick and unable. I felt like a broken piece of old furniture chucked out into the street from the fifth floor. One slightest move of any part of my body hurt like hell. I felt like I couldn't breathe properly. I needed air. I needed water. I could not get up. I was even afraid to move my head on the pillow so as to avoid more possible pain. I was just one huge battlefield of all kinds of pains spiced with a total lack of energy, breathlessness and a most absolute state of helplessness. I had done it. I'd reached the absolute pits of my life, the lowest point, a very, very miserable point at that.

All I wanted and could do was sleep, but the attentive staff would not let me enter into a deep and healing slumber, they were in every hour to check on me properly. The care was total, but also irritating. I should've been grateful, not irritated. Yet I was helplessly irritated and wanted only to be left alone. 

The very next day there was a guy of very athletic physique who had a very deep and commanding voice: ''Get up, we're going for a walk!'' the voice said above me.

''For a what? You must be kidding, I can hardly lie on this bed…''

''You must walk, come on, get up!''

I thought I would die right there and then, and the post-operation ordeal seemed totally pointless. He helped me out of my bed with his strong arms, I let out a shriek as my entire body stiffened into a complete and utter pain. My legs were shaky, insecure, pains probed me at random everywhere. We did two lengths of the corridor. I lay back on the bed, depraved of life, in brief. I felt I'd done a marathon. They kept coming in and checking on me and asking me about this and that, taking my blood pressure, my temperature, giving me some pills, pain relief, food, checking on my wounds, measuring this, that, asking similar questions over and over. Irritating at the time, but what amazing care from the Croatian public health system this was.

My sarcastic roommate was released and it made me very sad back then, how I longed to leave this environment. Then, finally the day came when they told me I was going back to my original room in the hospital I was checked in at first. There I found out - I who have been fit and slim all my life, had lost a massive 8 kg. I dared to look at myself in the mirror and immediately thought I'd qualify as a photo model for a labour camp. Even my eyes had changed, they were sullen, sunken, looking back at me hopelessly from some hollow spaces, somehow from afar. My greying skin seemed to have belonged to someone bigger, my arms were like two pieces of dry smoked meat. It was horrendous.

After some days, some more blood tests, some more tests, some more questions, I was tested for covid and then released home. It was the very end of June. The temperature outside was around 30º C. I could make it to the kitchen owing to the help of my hands and door frames only, from one to another, aiming with concentration and focus. I had family there to help me and they couldn't do enough for me, which was a God send. My doctor friend came to check on me, to remove my stitches, to check my wounds. I began to walk, each day a little longer, I began to take my body as seriously as it had so nearly taken me for my negligence.

As I'm writing this six months later, I've put the weight I lost back on and I feel I belong to another, far more normal world with that wonderful sensation when you bend to pick something up and nothing hurts. I have taken up exercise regularly, even physiotherapy (another utterly professional service in the very heart of Zagreb), I try to walk as often as I can, to use my Orbitrek and, well, to be happy, meeting with friends for coffees and lunches with all serenity and joy, remembering well what Hadrian had eerily warned me of such long time ago.

Albeit at times when, indeed, there were also my grandparents and parents and aunts and uncles that I would not listen to regardless of their gender, age or advice. I was young enough to know everything, wasn’t I? Weren't we all?

Do not wait to be hit all of a sudden, don't harm your heart until it says no more, check your health thoroughly and profoundly, give up smoking (I know, it's preposterous coming from a filthy ex chain smoker of like 40 cigarettes a day), but if I can stop totally, you can too. Have a drink and be happy for as long as it lasts, because there is an expiry date and more often than not, it comes silently. 

Say what you want about Croatian corruption, politics, the lack of funding, the lack of... well, a lot. But Croatian public health stepped up and saved my life at the very last minute. There are a great many truly extraordinary doctors and other medical personnel in this country. Just in case you read this article with a cigarette in hand not having moved around for a few days... just sayin’. But why should you listen to me after all I have gone through? I'm not your mother, for God’s sake, so let me just wish you a Happy New Year - from my heart!

If you would like further reading material and/or if you're trying to stop smoking, it's worth noting that cardiovascular disease kill more people in Croatia than anything else. That's right, even the dreaded cancer comes second to the silent killer. Did you know there is an artery called the widow maker? There's a reason. Cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of death and accounts for more than half the overall mortality in this country. Furthermore, cardiovascular mortality has been constantly rising since the 1970s due to our dire habits.

Despite Croatia's observance of World no Tobacco Day, smoking is still killing many here, and it is continuing to cripple the Croatian public health system. Hrvatski dan nepusenja (The Croatian day of non-smoking) is also prominent. Can we reverse the trend? Be a part of it before it's too late.