Where do Italians go for the most complex treatments? Here are the top 21 hospitals

The backbone of Italy's large hospitals stops in Rome. The maxi poles of excellence of the our health system that treat the most patients and manage the most complex cases, attracting Italians from other regions remain concentrated in the Centre-North. According to the latest map drawn up using, among other things, the latest data from the Sdo, the hospital discharge forms as of 2023, out of 21 'super hospitals', including both public and those affiliated with the SSN, only two are in the South, 12 in the North and 7 in the Centre.

This map updates the one published last year by the Ministry of Health, using the same two indicators (complexity of the cases treated per DRG and attractiveness of patients through mobility), and sees Lombardy take the lion's share with no less than five facilities, three of which have the highest scores, namely the Galeazzi, the Humanitas and the San Raffaele, all in Milan, the Humanitas and the San Raffaele, all in Milan, and after the Sant'Orsola in Emilia, the three hospitals in Veneto (Aou Verona, Sacro cuore Don Calabria and Aou Padua), the three in Tuscany (Aou Pisa, Aou Senese and the Careggi di Firenze), the three hospitals in Rome (Gemelli, Campus Biomedico and San Camillo) as well as the two Piedmontese (Mauriziano and Aou di Alessandria). While below the Capital only two super hospitals stand out among those with the most hospital discharges that excel on the basis of the mix of the two indicators (complexity of cases and attractiveness), namely the Azienda ospedaliera dei Colli di Napoli and the Casa sollievo della sofferenza di San Giovanni Rotondo in Puglia.

This imbalance encourages so-called 'hope trips', i.e. the displacement of hundreds of thousands of patients who move every year, especially from the South to the North, in search of the specialist care they need, a phenomenon that in 2023 alone was close to 3 billion in terms of the value of admissions outside the region.

This is why the Ministry of Health wants to take corrective action by rebalancing this disproportion with a long-awaited reform confirmed in recent days by minister Orazio Schillaci on Radio24: "When we talk about structural reform of the SSN it is clear that it must be done, after 47 years it must be modernised while respecting the basic principles of universality and free care. We have prepared two attachments to the financial bill, one that we will present shortly and concerns the reorganisation of the health professions and the other on the strengthening of the hospital network and the territorial network, this is needed to make the system more efficient'.

A restyling of the SSN, the latter, which will start from the hospital network to arrive at the reform of family doctors, and which could see the light immediately after the summer in the form of a delegated decree: The aim is to create a network of third-level 'national reference hospitals' that will be able to count on the latest cutting-edge medical equipment and the healthcare personnel they need, without stakes and ceilings on recruitment, thanks to funding that will come directly from Rome and no longer just from the regions to which they currently belong, not without some problems, especially where there is a recovery plan.