In the hospitals of the future, it will be possible to execute “copies” of the patient based on imaging investigations, and certain interventions to be practiced in this way to minimize the risks. Medical caravans could, on the other hand, be the solution for rapid diagnosis in underprivileged areas.
A problem today difficult to solve, the population’s unequal access to medical services, could be overcome in a short time by using increasingly sophisticated devices to be used when a health professional arrives at patients.
The doctor Adrian Streinu Cercel, present at the round table recently organized by the Federation of Associations of Cancer Patients (FABC) on the occasion of the presentation of the results of the caravan “I didn’t do enough”, emphasized the importance of the medical caravans organized by various entities. Such initiatives will be even more useful in the future, when those who arrive in disadvantaged localities could, in a single visit, gather important data for the patient, but also for the health system, while also providing the patient with a quick diagnosis.
“The data you have (n. ed. – the data collected by the FABC caravan during the investigation of over 1,000 patients from eight rural localities) it’s very interesting data, because it can form the basis of a mapping of the need for health, and I hope that in a relatively short time you can go to those people with wearable devices that collect information. I brought one of these devices with me today, which takes the pulse, the blood pressure, some frequencies, pulse oximetry, it’s crazy. But there are other devices, bracelets, which also take blood sugar, which also take urea and in the meantime do the lipid profile. So little by little we’re developing and then you could collect that kind of data that’s thrown over wi-fi into a health cloud and from there take any momentary analysis for that person to a place where an AI tells them if there’s any immediate risk or not and can also make an appointment.”the doctor explained how things could unfold in the future.
In order for such a scenario to be implemented, it is still necessary for someone to reach the patients today who lack access to medical services, and for this reason the importance of the caravans, most of which today are organized without the involvement of the state, could increase.
“Know that these things are not science fiction, they are found in the program that we are debating in the Health Committee in the Senate and applicable from 2034, when we want all medical units to be digitized and intelligent. And we go there with the idea that in tertiary hospitals, cognitive hospitals, they have the opportunity to duplicate the patient from the point of view of imaging, i.e. everything that means image – MRI, CT, ultrasound – is broken down and later reunified and makes a faithful copy of the patient. And the robots are supposed to work on the virtual copy, after which they intervene on the patient, so that the risks of complications or other things are minimized. These are called cognitive hospitals. To know that it exists on this planet called Earth is not something that crossed my mind. (…) This is what I want, including for the people who live in Romania”added Dr. Streinu-Cercel.
The possibility of organizing caravans in the countryside even by the state hospitals is in the plan of the authorities. Thus, the public public hospitals will have the opportunity, in the future service contract, to provide laboratory services that include the collection of samples in the territory, by means of caravans organized by the hospital that has an ambulatory structure.
Today, although patients have the possibility to ask their family doctor for a recommendation for routine investigations within the prevention program, investigations with a further preventive role represent very little of the total investigations prescribed.
The vice-president of the National Health Insurance House, Larisa Mezinu, stated in her turn that uninsured people can also benefit from the prevention services, with payment from the state budget, “so not from the contribution of those who pay insurance”. However, there are several aspects that make the program not run as expected. On the one hand, the population still does not make prevention analyzes a priority, on the other, not all medical service providers respond to patients’ requests, which is the reason for the lack of funds, even if there is no ceiling imposed for such services.
“We see that certain providers still haven’t changed their behavior, they don’t provide such services or, worse, they send patients for a walk. I want to tell you that the control bodies of the Health Insurance House, even if there are only a few of us, are doing their job. Recently, the headquarters of an important provider in the paraclinical area was closed for this reason, because it sent a number of patients who had a preventive referral ticket and who, of course, have access to services above the ceiling value. So there are no funds when we talk about prevention and monitoring of patients with diseases with a major impact on life, including those suffering from cancer, prevention is much more extensive”, stated Mezinu.
It is difficult to convince people to go and investigate their health status, the vice-president of CNAS also said, revealing that at the end of 2022 – the beginning of 2023, CNAS conducted a survey among people who addressed the institution with a request by e-mail, they were asked if they had carried out their preventive type analyses. Most of the interviewees had not done these analyses, and in the open-ended answer they explained that they had not done them because “if it doesn’t hurt, I’m not looking for it”.
As for the medical caravans, the idea that they can be organized with settlement through CNAS is not new, but only now have concrete steps been taken to put it into practice. “Since last month, through the second package of reforms in the health system, this possibility has been created. Therefore, any hospital that has a structure or that brings and forms a mobile caravan structure can go to rural areas to provide services for the early detection of diseases with a major impact on life. And here we are talking about diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, we are talking about cancer, we are talking about neurological diseases, but also about mental health. Because, I tell you, we have many elderly people in the rural area who are not looking for and have not heard of Alzheimer’s, of depression, of dementia, of all kinds of diseases, of mental health disorders that must be detected, must be treated. And this must mean a joint effort, a joint effort, both of the social health insurance, but also of the doctors, the hospitals, the providers who have a contract and who deliver services in the health insurance system”. Mezinu also said.
Prevention, an almost unknown concept in rural communities
The “I didn’t do enough” caravan organized by FABC between September and December 2025, with a focus on oncology, reached eight localities in five counties of the country, with 1,082 people being investigated. The data show that: 4% of those investigated show an increase in serum creatinine, which indicates kidney damage; 7% of the investigated men have elevated PSA values, which implies imaging investigations to determine the cause (it may also be an oncological condition); 8-13% have liver damage; 6% have a urinary infection; 4% had occult hemorrhages in the feces, which requires further investigations to evaluate possible lesions caused by colorectal cancer; 6.9% – had anemia; 25% have high blood sugar values - diabetes or inadequate glycemic control; 52% have elevated total cholesterol level; 30% – increased triglyceride values; 76.8% have a high level of LDL – cholesterol with an increased risk of cardiovascular diseases; 62% of the women present had never had a breast ultrasound or mammogram, and 24.5% had done it more than two years ago; only 13.5% of the investigated women had an ultrasound or mammography in the last 3 years; 93% of people over 50 have never had a fecal occult blood test (FIT test); 35% of women had never had an HPV or Pap test, and 23.5% had had it more than 3 years ago.
FABC has been running such caravans for 12 years, during which more than 13,600 people from 35 counties of the country were tested, thus discovering 35 cases of cancer.
