It is not known whether he worked in Post office or he was a postman's child, everyone is just a man Kragujevac called Postman. He became an urban legend thanks to his ability to "fix" bone fractures, sprains and joint dislocations, even though he was not even a doctor, let alone an orthopedist. He ordained in his apartment in Bubanj, from the eighties to the beginning of the 2000s.
"Everyone knew about him. People came from other cities. It was said that even doctors sent their patients to him," Saša, a man who grew up in that part of Kragujevac, tells us. "He fixed arms and legs, closed fractures and dislocations, but he didn't touch the spine. My mother went to him for a dislocated arm in 2009, but then she was told that he was sick and not working anymore."
Now is another time. "Kostolomci" and other folk visionaries are no longer recommended around the neighborhood over coffee, but mostly social networks. Instructions for quacks and healers arrive from the "Facebook Consilium".
A certain Nikola, for example, is unparalleled in the treatment of sinuses, Baba Milka "treats hearing problems without rinsing", Crni "fixes the back, and is also a bioenergetic expert". When a woman from Kragujevac asked on social networks to be directed to the phone number of "the man who adjusts the spine", the answers immediately arrived: "You have a gentleman in Maršić", which is a suburb of Kragujevac. Or: "You don't need a number, just ask at the market - people know."
Kada journalists they call you "spine adjusters" or others from popular recommendations, the connection is usually quickly broken. No one is in the mood for a media story.
The authorities did not respond to "Vremen"'s inquiries. Quacks they work smoothly even though the state should protect patients from charlatans, when they already flock to them when they want to be treated or "rejuvenated". A special question is how effective the system is to regulate areas of medicine that have only appeared in regulations in recent years, such as so-called antiaging and complementary medicine.
WHO CAN? "REJUVENATES"
When it comes to botox, hyaluronan, and fillers, which are different methods used to "iron out" wrinkles and dark circles or fill in lips, Kragujev women highly recommend and use certain VD Zažu, the girl "does a great job, and is also a medical professional."
Her profiles on social networks are full of photos of procedures, botox injections and mesotherapy are offered - means are injected with a needle to improve the appearance of the skin of the face. Although she attributes herself the title "Dr", this woman does not leave her photos. It is not in the database of the medical or dental chambers of Serbia, nor in the register of private practices, nor of cosmetic or beauty salons.
Doctor Goran Azanjac knows all that. It is enough, he says, to walk around the city and see that there is almost no street in Kragujevac without a "salon" where instant treatments are offered, and now, for beauty or health, anyway.
"These procedures may be performed by specialists in plastic surgery, dermatology or maxillofacial surgery surgery. Other doctors and dentists must first undergo serious education", he tells "Vreme". He adds that there is no question of this in Kragujevac. Because there are only about thirty such specialists there, and not all of them are active. "And what will we do with all the other surgeries?", he asks.
If it is by law, they should be locked, and those who work in them without a license should be severely punished. Because, since 2018, the Professional and Methodological Instruction for dealing with antiaging medicine has been in force. It says that Botox or chemical peels - which are used to remove the upper layers of dead skin with the help of chemical solutions - may only be used by health institutions and private practices. And there, they may only be performed by medical doctors with appropriate education. Technologies in the field of antiaging medicine require a special permit Ministry of Health.
However, that regulation has not yet fulfilled its purpose - to prevent these tricky interventions from turning into a commercial game with human health, to prevent them from being performed by beauticians, hairdressers, incomplete medical students or physiotherapists, or even by people who have no contact with medicine.
Azanjac, otherwise primarius, specialist in plastic and reconstructive surgery and president of the Board of Directors of the Medical Chamber of Serbia, says that there is a lot of work for the health inspection. "The key problem is that there is no serious control. Control of continuous medical educations is also necessary - who organizes the educations, whether they meet the criteria, whether they are one-day or two-day programs that are organized according to the weekend tourism system and can be attended by anyone who pays an expensive registration fee," says Azanjac.
He says that the Medical Chamber is already taking steps within its competence, but in order to separate the wheat from the chaff here, "the sieve must be thick".
photo: pexels / pavel danilyukIT DOESN'T HELP, IT OFTEN HARMS, BUT THAT'S WHY IT COSTS: Quackery
DOCTORS OR MATTRESS SALESMEN
The state also tried to create a "sieve" when it comes to methods of prevention, diagnosis and treatment, which were once popularly called alternative and now officially complementary medicine. The conditions for practicing complementary medicine are prescribed by Articles 217 and 218 of the Law on Health Care from 2019, as well as by the Rulebook adopted a year later.
These regulations define where and who can practice acupuncture, quantum medicine, homeopathy, traditional Indian or Chinese medicine, osteopathy, aromatherapy, or use qi gong, yoga and tai chi for medical purposes.
All this can be done by a health worker to whom the minister has issued a permit. The rulebook also states that only those methods are allowed that do not distract the patient from classical medicine.
Miljana Petrović from Kragujevac was, however, invited by phone at the end of last year for a "quantum medicine examination". She arrived in a room that was not a private practice, and was greeted by a person who did not look like a doctor.
"I had a very good experience with quantum medicine before - that's how it was in one office in Belgrade discovered insulin resistance," says Miljana Petrović. "That's why I responded to this call. However, the examination in Kragujevac was nothing like the one I had in Belgrade. In Belgrade, I was examined by a doctor, a specialist, here it was a guy who looked more like a traveling salesman."
After the inspection, as our interlocutor states, the persuasion to buy a mattress began. The price, a real trifle - over two thousand euros. "I told him I'd think about it. When I asked to have the test results printed, they said it wasn't house policy. That is, I only get the test results supposedly if I buy a mattress."
We were unable to find any practice at the address we received. The list of tenants on the intercom includes private persons and one trading company. There are betting shops and various shops in the surrounding area.
Dr. Jelena Džarić's phone also rang on two occasions. As she applies some of the methods of quantum medicine in her private practice in Kragujevac, out of curiosity she went to see how her "colleagues" work. "Both times, the purpose of the 'examination' was to sell a product that supposedly cures. Anyone can get a diagnostic device, but the results can only be read by a doctor who has the appropriate knowledge and experience," she told "Vreme".
Throughout Serbia, doctors apply various methods of complementary medicine. Other doctors consider them pseudoscience, even fraud. When there is no consensus within the profession, a layman suffering from an ailment can only guess who is right and squeeze his pocket so that he doesn't have to pay two thousand euros for a mattress that cures everything.
ONE INSPECTOR - 186 ORDINATION
It is not easy even for a layman to check whether someone posing as a doctor is really a doctor. On the website of the Ministry of Health, in the column in which the list of legal entities and natural persons holding a license should be published, it says only - the page is under construction. It could be searched in the database of the Agency for Economic Registers, but sometimes it is painstaking digging even for journalists. Lists of doctors and dentists exist on the websites of their chambers, but they are packed into documents that have 200 pages each.
It is not an easy task for health inspectors either. According to the systematization of work, the inspection has 52 positions, but according to data from last year, only 34 were filled. They should control 6.329 health institutions and private practices in Serbia - that is, 186 facilities per inspector.
Official reports show that last year, 2.293 citizens' petitions related to patients' rights were received. Of that number, 977 (36 percent) related to suspicion of professional error, and the inspections gave patients the right in 141 cases.
The report also says that during regular or extraordinary inspections, 42 bans on the performance of health activities were issued. This happens when someone does not meet the requirements in terms of personnel, equipment, premises, medicines and medical devices or does what he is not registered for.
The health inspectorate did not respond to Vremen's inquiries, among other things, about how many complaints are related to errors in the field of antiaging and complementary medicine. Thus, it remains unclear to what extent the inspection generally deals with charlatans and traders under the guise of "doctors", although this illegal work is also within its jurisdiction.
During the year 2024, only three unregistered entities were discovered that performed healthcare activities - fewer than you would find in one walk around Kragujevac, for example. More alleged illegal doctors were found during 2021 and 2022, when controls were strengthened - a total of 52 unregistered facilities were discovered then.
Among them, as stated in the reports, "was a large share of beauty salons that performed the health activity of antiaging medicine", which the inspectors discovered "by searching for advertising of these services on the Internet".
A FEW COMPLAINTS AGAINST THE CHARACTERS
Even the MUP did not respond to the inquiry as to how often citizens report quacks.
News reaches the media only sporadically, usually with a touch of fanfare. The most famous "convict" for quackery is Miroljub Petrović, a popular guest on podcasts and some television channels, where he talks about theocracy, healthy life and the "Serbian hero" Skanderbeg. According to the judgment of the court in Leskovac (2019), he was sentenced to a fine of one hundred thousand dinars, and the objects of the crime - tinctures, extracts, teas and juices - were confiscated. This came after accusations that he prescribed his own preparations for treatment to a man suffering from a brain tumor and treated him with classical medicine, which he calls "beef".
In the middle of 2021, a masseur from Batajnica and his mother, a florist, were arrested in Belgrade, because they provided health services in the field of aesthetic surgery in the unregistered practice "Dr. Sauvage" in Terazije.
In the same year, OM (31), who provided anti-aging medicine services at the unregistered "Tayas medical and aesthetic center" in Belgrade, was arrested on suspicion of practicing quackery. As the Ministry of Internal Affairs announced at the time, eleven victims reported to the police because the interventions caused them physical injuries or impaired their health.
But that's just the tip of the iceberg. The decades-long experience of Zoran Stanišić, a retired police officer who until a few years ago was the head of the Criminal Police Department in Kragujevac, and now the owner of a detective agency, shows that there are almost no reports of quacks in the Šumadija area.
"I think that in the last two decades, there were only two or three reports from citizens, and even then they were related to 'midwives' in rural areas," says Stanišić. On the other hand, citizens do not report healers, magicians or similar quacks. This, he says, makes it difficult for the police, who "even when they have certain knowledge, can rarely act without a report".
And the people of Kragujevac not only don't report, but in groups on Facebook they also recommend "bone breakers" who today are known by the nickname Postman. I guess they attract more customers under that "company" thanks to the legend of the Postman from the village of Bubanj.
author: Marija Obrenović
mentor: Nemanja Rujević
