Treatment on the continental shelf

Patient injuries that occur on the continental shelf do normally not fall under the patient injury scheme. Patients will therefore not be entitled to apply for compensation from NPE.

Print Norsk | 29. March 2017

Generally, only injuries that occur within the kingdom, including Svalbard, will be covered by the scheme. The continental shelf is not considered part of the kingdom.

If a patient working offshore on the continental shelf receives treatment by authorised Norwegian healthcare professionals on the continental shelf, it would fall outside of the scheme. Enterprises that provide treatment on the continental shelf must therefore take out separate insurance outside of NPE.

In some cases, there may be doubts as to whether the treatment takes place on the continental shelf or not.

Some examples:

  • If treatment of a patient was initiated onshore, and the patient receives telephone follow-up from the onshore physician while working on the continental shelf, it will be covered by the scheme.
  • If the treatment is initiated and provided on the continental shelf but the healthcare professionals on the continental shelf contact a physician onshore via telephone, it will still be considered treatment provided on the continental shelf. Such treatment is not covered by the scheme.
  • If the patient is transported from the continental shelf for treatment onshore in Norway, the treatment provided onshore and any injuries resulting from such treatment will be covered by the scheme as normal.

In order for treatment provided on the continental shelf to be considered part of the patient injury scheme, a change to laws or regulations would be required. Currently no such changes have been made.