His dance brought him global fame, but Zsolt Hegedűs wants to be known for reforming the ailing Hungarian healthcare system

Besides the euphoria of the crowds in the streets of Budapest and Péter Magyar’s victory speech on election night, the footage of a victory dance also made global headlines after April 12. Millions of people around the world saw Zsolt Hegedűs’s air guitar and breakdancing moves – not typically seen from politicians – which he performed at the victory celebration on Batthyány Square. Among others, The Times also devoted a separate article to it.

The future health minister of the Tisza government later said that in the midst of all the jubilation, he had forgotten that the whole world was watching them; in the future, however, he hopes to not just be famous for his victory dance, but also for reforming his area of expertise. This, however, will certainly not be easy in a sector that is probably the one facing the biggest challenges in Hungary nowadays, especially since this is the first time it will have been given its own ministry after 16 years of Orbán governments.

From orthopedic specialist to health policy maker

Zsolt Hegedűs, 56, is a leading authority in orthopedic surgery and a specialist in lower limb medicine. He earned his medical degree from SOTE in 1994, and moved to the United Kingdom in 2005; he is now a dual British-Hungarian citizen. Initially, he headed the orthopedic department at Manchester hospital, then continued his medical career at the Practice Plus Group hospital near Bristol.

He moved back to Hungary in 2015 with the ambition of integrating the professional skills he had acquired abroad into the Hungarian healthcare system. At that time, he became the leader of the movement called “1001 Doctors Without Gratuities,” which aimed to completely eliminate gratuity payments from the Hungarian healthcare system. For a while he also chaired the Ethics Committee of the Hungarian Medical Chamber (MOK). In recent years, he has served as an orthopedic specialist at Wáberer Medical Center, while also continuing to work in England. He believes that patient-centered healthcare, where everything is done for the patient and in the patient’s best interest is of utmost importance. Two of his four sons attended the University of Oxford; one of them later became a five-time powerlifting Hungarian champion.

Hegedűs made his debut as Tisza’s healthcare expert at the party’s congress last July. In our interview at that time, he spoke about how, using the knowledge he gained abroad, he and his colleagues prepared a considerable amount of professional material for the Fidesz government, none of which have ever been used: their documents on healthcare reform have been sitting in Sándor Pintér’s (outgoing Interior Minister, who was also responsible for Healthcare-TN) drawer ever since. This is why he joined the Tisza Party, so that his visions could actually be put into practice.

According to Hegedűs, as the future Minister of Health, he faces a challenging and responsibility-laden task, and he will work to incorporate the most effective elements of the British healthcare system into the Hungarian one—primarily in areas such as transparency, ethical guidelines, a culture of learning, and the processing of patient feedback.

Zsolt Hegedűs’s key healthcare proposals are as follows:

• He considers it a flawed and outdated system that patients in the Hungarian healthcare system have no say in decisions regarding their own treatment.
• He views the measurement, validation, and publication of healthcare quality indicators as one of the most important cornerstones of healthcare reform. In his view, the transparent presentation of data is able to exert pressure on decision-makers in and of itself.
• He believes that instead of a culture of fault-finding, a culture of learning should be established, based on the principle that “if the desired outcome is not achieved or a patient files a complaint, it must be investigated.” In his opinion honesty is a duty, not a risk. The “duty of honesty” practised in England can serve as a model for this, in which, in the event of professional error, the patient receives an explanation about what might have happened and what the doctors are doing to ensure it does not happen again.
• He would also handle hospital-acquired infections based on the English model: They would launch a poster campaign with the help of the Medical Chamber, explaining how family members can help prevent hospital-acquired infections: what food they can bring when visiting, where they can sit, and what they can touch in the ward. The posters would be displayed in hospitals within the first hundred days, and data on hospital infections—which has been classified until now—would be made public.
• On the other hand, he would phase out the facial recognition systems at hospitals which have sparked significant controversy. In his view, this follows the logic of a police-style management model rather than being in line with the approach of healthcare workers.
• He believes that with complex organizational measures, it would be possible to reduce the currently 6-7-year-long waiting lists for hip and knee replacement surgeries—his area of expertise—to a maximum of 6 months by the end of 2027.

Prime Minister-elect Péter Magyar announced the Tisza Party's healthcare program last fall, and according to him, the newly established Ministry of Health will work to ensure that “as many Hungarians as possible can live as long as possible in good mental and physical health.” According to the program, the Tisza government will increase budgetary resources allocated to public healthcare by at least 500 billion forints annually, improve the healthcare system, and establish seven regional super-hospitals. They will improve the nurse-to-doctor ratio and plan wage adjustments for non-medical positions as well, will upgrade smaller rural hospitals, and will significantly increase funding for the training of doctors and nurses.

Zsolt Hegedűs entered parliament from the 11th place on the Tisza Party's national list. In our interview last year, he said he hoped not to become a political figure.

“I’m going to leave politics to the politicians; of course, there will be some overlap, but as long as the Tisza Party wants my professional expertise and my heart, and respects my intellectual independence, they’ll be able to make good use of me. If they should ever expect me to give up this kind of intellectual independence, then it wouldn’t work.