You don’t always need to see a doctor: a nurse can also prescribe medication
A significant change is underway in the Lithuanian healthcare system: nurses are taking over certain functions from doctors and assuming greater responsibilities, making their role increasingly important. Today, these specialists issue several dozen times more reimbursed prescriptions than a few years ago, and their expanding competencies each year allow patients to access necessary medicines, medical devices, or tests more quickly and easily—without unnecessary visits to doctors.
Issuing an increasing share of prescriptions
Although doctors issue the majority of reimbursed medicines and medical aids prescriptions, the contribution of nurses has grown noticeably. Three years ago, nurses issued around 77,000 reimbursed prescriptions, whereas last year they issued nearly 1.8 million – about 23 times more. In 2025, prescriptions issued by nurses accounted for approximately 14% of all reimbursed prescriptions issued nationwide.
“The jump in the number of prescriptions issued by nurses is the result of changes in recent years. These changes have enabled these specialists to perform more functions and thus contribute to reducing queues at doctors’ offices. In most cases, general practice and advanced practice nurses can now extend the treatment of chronic diseases prescribed by doctors by prescribing medication. This means that patients no longer need to register with a doctor every time – it is enough for the doctor to assess the person’s health once a year,” says Evaldas Stropus, head of the Pharmaceuticals Reimbursement Division at the National Health Insurance Fund (NHIF).
Nurses may issue medications for no longer than one year, provided that the patient’s health condition is stable, he/she has been using medications for at least three months, and medications are not classified as narcotic, psychotropic, named, or unregistered medications.
When a doctor establishes a diagnosis and provides recommendations, nurses, within their competence, can prescribe not only medications but also medical aids, issue prescriptions, and continue prescribing these supplies. For example, nurses can prescribe and issue dressings, hydrogel, diagnostic strips for measuring glucose or assessing blood coagulation status, nursing supplies (diapers, pads, disposable bed sheets, catheters, etc.), replacement kits for insulin pumps, disposable needles for syringes, stoma care supplies, and other similar aids.
Provides a wide range of services
Diana Prochorova, senior specialist at the NHIF Service Reimbursement Division, emphasizes that nurses play a particularly important role in outpatient care and inpatient services. The competence of representatives of this profession covers an increasing range of services. For example, nurses in a family doctor’s team consistently check patients’ vital signs, perform and evaluate tests, administer vaccinations, administer medication, and care for wounds and ulcers. In addition, they can independently prescribe certain tests and analyze their results, perform preventive check-ups for children and adults, care for newborns, advise on the use of medications prescribed by a doctor, draw up an individual care plan, implement it, and evaluate the results.
According to D. Prochorova, these nurses also play a particularly important role in organizing and providing care services to people with chronic diseases or those who are recovering from surgery. With the growing number of people who need nursing services at home, representatives of this profession are actively involved in providing them.
They can also issue referrals
The Health Insurance Fund reminds that general practice and advanced practice nurses can, in certain cases, issue referrals for medical tests. They can also issue referrals for mammograms under the breast cancer prevention program or to a diabetes nurse. A referral to a specialist consultation, when necessary, can be issued by a nurse working in the emergency department based on the decision of the department’s physician, or by a hospital nurse for an inpatient based on the decision of the attending physician.
Recent years’ developments show that nurses are taking on an increasing share of responsibility, allowing doctors to focus more on complex cases and enabling patients to receive care more quickly.
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