Regional Chidhood Cancer Parent Organizations
Member of ICCCPO
International Confederation of Childhood Cancer Parent Organizations

Croatia

  [Hrvatski]

In Croatia every year more then 150 children die from malign diseases and that number is constantly rising for about 1% percent a year. Treatment usually lasts between 8 and 12 months. Percentage of the children that are being cured is between 70 and 90 percent (it depends on a type of tumor), or to put it differently, two out of three children with the disease will be successfully cured.

Children from Bosnia and Herzegovina and Serbia are also coming to Croatia for treatment. We do not know the total number of children that are being treated in Croatia in one year.

The hospitals in Croatia in which children are being treated for malign diseases are the following:
• Clinic for children diseases Zagreb, Klaićeva 16, Zagreb
• Hospital clinic center Zagreb, Šalata 2, Zagreb
• Clinical hospital “Sestre Milosrdnice”, Vinogradska 29, Zagreb
• Hospital clinic center Rijeka, Krešimirova 22, Rijeka
• Clinical hospital Split, Spinčićeva 1, Split

There are also many associations that are helping children and their families faced with malign diseases. In most of the associations only parents of the children with the malign diseases are working (on a voluntary basis or for a small fees) and they see that model as the most correct and the most desirable one, in other words as their advantage. At the moment head of "Krijesnica" association is a person that does not have a history of malign diseases in his family. Assembly of "Krijesnica" association that consists exclusively of the parents of the children with malign diseases thinks that that is a good solution.

The associations that are dealing with the problems of children oncology are:
• "Krijesnica" – association for the help to children and their families faced with the malign diseases, Prilaz Gjure Deželića 50, Zagreb, www.krijesnica.hr
• Parents’ club of the children from the hematology and oncology department of the clinical hospital center Šalata, Šalata 2, Zagreb
• "Sanus" – parents’ club of the children who had and were being treated for malign diseases, www.sanus.hr
• "Moje dijete" – association of the parents of the children who had and were being treated for malign diseases, Trg Ljudevita Gaja 8, Osijek, www.mojedijete.hr
• "Iskrice" , Dalmatinska 2, Vinkovci
• "Pčelica", Frankopanska 213, Požega
• "Naša nada" – association of the parents of the children who had and were being treated for malign diseases, Braće Radića 13a, Slatina, nasa.nada@gmail.com
• Croatian association of the people with leukemia and lymphoma, Strossmayerova 9, Čakovec, www.uoll.hr
• "Zajedno do zdravlja" – association of the chronically ill child, Dr. Roka Mišetića bb, PP 349, Dubrovnik, www.zajedno-do-zdravlja.hr
• "Zajedno" - association of the parents of the children who had and were being treated for malign diseases, Slaviše Vajnera Čiče 8, Rijeka
• "Iskra" - association of the parents of the children who had and were being treated for malign diseases, Kralja Zvonimira 17, Otočac

Association "Sanus" from Split was the initiator for the opening and registering associations for helping the children with malign diseases in smaller places in Croatia.

It is possible that we are unaware of the work of some associations in Croatia that are offering the help to children with malign diseases, so for that reason they are not mentioned here. We are asking everyone to warn us about possible errors and to contact us at krijesnica@krijesnica.hr.

Problems that the children with the malign diseases and their parents are faced with are numerous. We are mentioning those that are the most significant:
• insufficient accommodation capacity at the oncology departments (because of that therapy procedures are being postponed)
• very modest list of medicines that are being paid by the Croatian national health service
• very long administrative procedures for the approval for the purchase of exceptionally expensive medicines
• here are no hospices as a separate medical units (children that are just being diagnosed with the malign disease are placed next to the children in terminal phase)
• lack of non-medical expert staff (psychologist, defectologists (special education teachers), pedagogues, work therapists, …)
• difficulties with the return of cured child into its home environment (rejection of the society, the disease has to be kept secret, because "who will merry the girl who had cancer" etc.)

As a very positive thing we would like to emphasize the expertise of our oncologists. Many parents who for various reasons sent their children for the treatment abroad brought their children back to Croatia for the rest of the treatment, because that was what foreign doctors recommended after they have been convinced that there are no differences in medical protocols between Croatia and other countries.

In the clinic for children diseases in Zagreb since 2006 centre for stem cells transportations has been operating very successfully.