Primary care specialists

Primary care specialists, i.e. general practitioners (GPs) and outpatient specialists, are usually the first components of the comprehensive cancer care, playing their role particularly at the diagnostic stage. Complex preventive check-ups at GPs are reimbursed from the public health insurance, and all patients are eligible for them every two years. Additionally, women are eligible to a preventive gynaecological check-up once a year; these check-ups are also reimbursed from the public health insurance, meaning that women do not have to pay for them at all.

Furthermore, GPs and gynaecologists are involved in all three of the above-mentioned cancer screening programmes. As part of the colorectal cancer screening, they distribute faecal occult blood tests (FOBTs) to their patients – or refer them to colonoscopy, if needed; as part of breast cancer screening, they refer them to mammography centres; as part of cervical cancer screening, gynaecologists send the Pap-smears (taken during preventive check-ups) to cytology laboratories.

As described above, primary care specialists cooperate closely with other components of the comprehensive cancer care in the Czech Republic. A complete overview of healthcare facilities and outpatient clinics in individual regions of the Czech Republic is available at www.onconet.cz, the official website of the Czech National Cancer Control Programme.