How to access Healthcare in Italy as an International Student

By - Sweta

In this article you will find an overview of how healthcare in Italy works and what you will need to be able to access the services offered.

Your healthcare will be covered by your government if you are an EU student.

If you are non-EU with a study permit, signing up for public insurance is voluntary and costs about 150 euros. Non-EU students will however also need to subscribe to a private policy for emergency healthcare coverage to be able to request the Permesso di Soggiorno, these policies usually are around 100 euros. Emergency care can be covered if you are citizen from a Non-EU country with which Italy signed international agreements regulating reciprocal healthcare: Argentina, Australia, Bosnia-Erzegovina, Macedonia, Brazil, Montenegro, Cape Verde (temporarily suspended), Principato di Monaco, Vatican City State and Holy See, Republic of S. Marino, Serbia, Tunisia. Ask your embassy for more information.

Italian Public healthcare is through a system where you will first visit a general practitioner who will give general care, or give you a “ticket” to visit specialists. The GP visit is free but to go to the specialists and to order tests you will have to pay a small co-payment fee, around 36 euros or so depending on the specialist and tests. Dental care is also provided with the public health system, including dental emergency rooms. It is funded through direct taxation and is handled at a local (regional) level through the local health authority, ASL.

You will be able to access healthcare all over Europe upon presentation of a Tessera Sanitaria, the easiest way being through the ER for emergencies. They will send you a bill later at your Italian address, which you can request a reimbursement for from your local ASL.

The time-frame for access to healthcare depends on what you will need. Some expected times are:

Scheduling an appointment with your GP: within a few days from your call.
Treatment in the ER: a few hours of waiting time depending on severity.
Specialist referrals: within a couple months.

Private clinics are available too and generally have shorter waiting times, although are a bit more expensive.

Insurance and Healthcare for EU Citizens

EHIC (EU Health insurance Card)
The EHIC is a free card that gives you access to medically necessary, state-provided healthcare during a temporary stay in any of the 27 EU countries, Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway and Switzerland under the same conditions and at the same cost (free in some countries) as people insured in that country. The benefits covered include, for example, benefits provided in conjunction with chronic or existing illnesses as well as in conjunction with pregnancy and childbirth. Cards are issued by your national health insurance provider. You wont need to register with the Italian healthcare system.

UK students
From 1 January 2021 healthcare cover is provided to students in possession of UK European Health Insurance Card (EHIC). You will only be able to use your EHIC in the country you are studying in and only while you continue studying there. This country is identified on your EHIC (field n °6) by an international country code (IT for Italy).

S1 Form
When you move your habitual residence to another country, you should register with the S1 form instead of using the EHIC to receive medical care in your new country of habitual residence. The form is issued by your home country, you will have access to medical care and will be assigned a specific family doctor. With this form you will need to register with the Italian Health Care System. The registration is free.

Insurance and Healthcare for non-EU Citizens

Private Insurance

If you are in possession of a private medical insurance policy against illness and accident, you can access medical care and specific treatments or examinations. You will be asked to pay the whole cost of specialised visits, blood tests, instrumental diagnostics etc. You have to keep all the receipts in order to ask for a reimbursement from your insurance provider.

Italian National Health System

Signing up is voluntary for people holding a study permit. Remember that this is not the same as the insurance for basic emergency coverage that you need to sign up for the Permesso di Soggiorno (study permit). The registration is valid for one calendar year starting from the 1st of January to the 31st of December, meaning that if you sign up in September you will only avail the remaining months in the year until the end of December.

Documents needed for registration:

Valid Permesso di Soggiorno, or the reciept of renewal
Codice Fiscale
For students: Certificate of Enrolment to the university
Reciept of payment at the post office

How to pay for the Regional Health Service

For holders of residence permits for study reasons, voluntary registration with the Regional Health Service is required with a contribution payment of 149.77 Euros (2021)

The contribution is to be paid at the post office using the available forms there:

c/c postale:
payable to: Tesoreria Provinciale dello Stato, you can find the exact details for your local state in the links below.
motive: iscrizione al Servizio Sanitario Nazionale anno [year, eg. 2021]

Choosing a Doctor

You will have to sign up at the ASL office that is closest to your current residence. When you are registering with the Italian Public Health Service, you will be asked to choose a Medico di Base (General Practitioner/Family Doctor). The local ASL office will have a list of doctors available in the area for you to choose from. You can find this list online on their site and at the office itself. If you don’t know who to choose, look through local facebook groups for any mention of english speaking doctors, or just choose the one closest to your house, in general you can trust them to provide good service. Visiting your assigned Medico di Base is free, but you may have to pay for the medications they prescribe or for the specialist visits they will refer you to.

Going to Doctor

You can refer to your GP when you need general medical advice, medicine that pharmacies need a prescription for or a referral to a specialist visit or examination such as a gynaecological referral or a blood test.

As an overview, these are the steps to reach out for healthcare in Italy:

Register for public insurance (you must be resident in/have a house contract for that zone), select GP from list.
Call your GP for an appointment, go to your GP, give them your medical history and complaints.
GP will give an orange slip of paper if handwritten or a white printed out “ricetta” (ticket) with various numbers and information if it’s a specialist referral, or a prescription which you will show at the pharmacy to obtain your medications.
Incase of a specialist referral, you have to call a regional number (CUP) and they will ask for information on the referral slip. They will confirm and assign you a doctor and appointment at hospital in your city. There is the option to do this online through the regional FSE (fasicolo sanitario electtronico) but will need a SPID to access this service.
On the day you go to the specialist, go at least 30 minutes early to pay for the “ticket” at the “cassa”. Hospitals in Italy can be confusing and large so maybe even an hour early would be better just to be able to navigate the hospital itself and find where you need to be.

If you don’t speak Italian you are not going to find it easy, ask an Italian speaking friend if they can help you, especially when you call the CUP to schedule an appointment.

Mental Health Counselling

Most universities will provide mental health counselling for enrolled students, you can for information from your course secretary or the help office. You can also look online for private therapists. In larger cities there are plenty of english speaking therapists and can cater to international difficulties. Costs would be around 30 to 70 euros per session. Don’t hesitate to reach out if you’re facing any kind of problems, it’s always better to confront these problems early before they accumulate. It is easy to end up falling behind with the flexible exam scheduling present in most universities, this can result in being behind with respect to your peers on many exams which can cause further stress.
Living in a foreign country itself can be stressful to adapt to and you should give yourself time and allowance to learn the local culture and lifestyle. Not everyone can jump in and start university life easily from day one.