The hospital service

The hospital service undertakes patient analysis, treatments and care of people’s physical and mental health.

The hospital service includes the National Hospital of the Faroe Islands, the hospital in Klaksvík, the hospital in Suðuroy, the patient hospital in Tórshavn, the Department for Work and Public Health and others.

The National Hospital of the Faroe Islands

The National Hospital of the Faroe Islands is the main hospital in the Faroe Islands, and it is the biggest singular workplace in the country. The vision is to offer Faroese people a good health service in continuously more areas at home in the Faroe Islands, and if this is not possible, the vision is to offer a safe patient treatment through a good co-operation with hospitals abroad.

There are approx. 850 employees divided into around 30 work groups in the National Hospital of the Faroe Islands.

  • 29 specialized branches (including 9 consultant arrangements)
  • 170 sleeping accommodations
  • 8.000 hospitalizations yearly
  • 60.000 ambulatory treatments
  • 524.268 laboratory researches yearly
  • 34.000 x-ray examinations yearly

Clinical service departments are also in the National Hospital of the Faroe Islands, which provide services to treatment centers in the National Hospital of the Faroe Islands and other external services. These treatment centers provided in the National Hospital of the Faroe Islands are x-ray, research laboratory, anaesthetization, occupational therapy and physical therapy.

The hospital in Klaksvík

The hospital in Klaksvík has a common ward for the medical- and surgical ward, which has 28 sleeping accommodations.

The hospital in Klaksvík employs a medical superintendent and two surgical superintendents. Substitutes take care of the anaesthetization and residents take care of resident duty. The back outpatient clinic and special treatment offers are for children. The hospital in Klaksvík co-operates with the National Hospital of the Faroe Islands, when it comes to the special medical areas. There is for example a co-operation with an x-ray doctor. Occasionally other doctors in other special areas provide their expertise in urology, hand surgery and shoulder surgery among other things.

Once a week the research laboratory in the hospital in Klaksvík is open in the medical center in Gøtudali and in Runavík.

The hospital in Suðuroy

The hospital in Suðuroy has a common surgical- and medical ward. The hospital in Suðuroy employs two surgical superintendents and one medical superintendent. The hospital in Suðuroy has 26 sleeping accommodations, and it has a laboratory in the medical center in Vági, which is open two times a week, where it is possible for outpatients to take blood tests and so on. The plan is to develop the service.

The resident duty is organized in a way that it functions as being on duty in a co-operation with the general practitioner (1870) between 16 and 8 o’clock.

Special treatment abroad

Patients on and off need treatments, which are not provided in the Faroe Islands, and therefore it is necessary to send patients abroad for treatments.

The majority of the Faroese patients who go abroad are sent to Rigshospitalet in Copenhagen. In this connection, a new agreement is made between the Faroese hospital service and Rigshospitalet every year, which allows Faroese patients to be treated in the facilities at Rigshospitalet.

The law concerning the Faroese Hospital Service states that superintendents in the Faroese health service have the possibility to send patients abroad, when there is a need of a treatment, which is not offered in the Faroe Islands.