Nonetheless, there are no major differences among patient profiles the clinics take in nor in the type of illnesses they treat most often.

The largest share of patients requiring pro bono healthcare are people who cannot afford mandatory health insurance, including former entrepreneurs or people who lost their jobs due to redundancy. Clinics also treat migrant workers and refugees, as well as the homeless.

The lists of the most frequent illnesses treated in clinics across the country are rather similar, including acute and chronic respiratory disease, cardio-vascular disease, chronic digestive illnesses, diabetes and cancer.

Cancer patients face the biggest problems, as they cannot get access to palliative care because they have no insurance, according to Ninna Kozorog, the head of the Maribor clinic.

The biggest of all pro bono clinics is the one in Ljubljana, which had 670 patients last year, requiring 5,000 medical procedures. The number of patients in Ljubljana has been steadily increasing over the past years by around 100 annually.

Some 30 doctors and 20 other experts, including dentists, psychotherapists and lawyers, among others, performed a total of 2,500 man-hours at the Ljubljana clinic last year.

This is only slightly more than in Maribor, where 42 doctors, six dentists, an optician and nurse take care of the patients. The clinic reported an increase in patients of nearly 27% last year, adding that it treated 450-500 people annually.

The situation is somewhat different in Murska Sobota, where the number of patients has been declining for a while. However, the single doctor volunteering in the clinic still sees some 20 patients a month.

Meanwhile, a pro bono clinic in Velenje closed recently after it was used by only eight patients since its launch in spring 2014. On the other hand, a new clinic is likely to be set in nearby Celje, a city that is bigger than Velenje.

A new clinic also just opened in Nova Gorica. Here, two retired doctors are expected to provide health care to some 650 people without health insurance who live in the region.