ABSTRACT
Between 1999 and 2005 in Switzerland, coverage for five types of “médecines complémentaires” (the French term for complementary medicine) was temporarily integrated into compulsory public health insurance (CHI): these included anthroposophic medicine, homeopathy, neural therapy, herbal medicine and traditional Chinese medicine. During that time, these specific kinds of medical care were covered for all insured patients, as long as treatments were prescribed and carried out by physicians recognized by the Swiss Federation of Physicians (FMH). At the end of the period, these approaches were deemed unable to meet the three criteria set in the law permitting reimbursement by CHI (article 32 of the LAMal or health insurance federal law) – that is, efficacy, appropriateness and economic efficiency; they were thus no longer to be covered by public insurance. However, the decision to terminate public coverage was contested and a renewed temporary integration into CHI of these five treatment approaches is being tested for a new period extending from January 1, 2012 to the end of 2017.
