Kuwait sets KD 200 fee to appeal medical liability

Challenging a medical report in Kuwait will now cost you KD 200.

The Ministry of Health has set new fees for the Medical Liability Authority, the body that reviews complaints and technical reports linked to medical practice in Kuwait. The change affects doctors, clinics, hospitals and anyone involved in a medical liability case, and it starts in just a few days.

If you’ve followed how Kuwait has been tightening paperwork and fees across different services lately, from the KD 100 lost passport fee to new rules on company licences, this fits the same pattern: clearer charges, firmer deadlines.

What exactly changed?

Minister of Health Dr Ahmed Al-Awadhi signed Ministerial Decree No. 351 of 2026. It was published in Kuwait’s official gazette, Kuwait Alyawm, and sets out clear charges for services handled by the Medical Liability Authority.

Before this, there was no single fixed fee structure for these administrative and technical requests. Now every request has a clear price tag attached to it.

Under the decree, two main charges apply:

• KD 20 – for each administrative service request made by health care professionals or facilities, for Health Licensing Department matters, and for requests to get extra copies of technical committee reports.
• KD 200 – for each request to form an appeals committee, which reviews a technical committee’s report when someone disagrees with its findings.

So who does this affect?

This mainly affects health care professionals and health facilities in Kuwait – doctors, nurses, clinics and hospitals who deal with the Medical Liability Authority or the Health Licensing Department.

It also affects anyone involved in a medical liability dispute who wants a technical committee’s report reviewed. That could include a patient’s side or a practitioner’s side, depending on how the case started.

If you’ve read our coverage on how a man was accused of posing as a doctor at Jahra Hospital, you’ll know the Ministry of Health has been pushing to tighten oversight of medical practice generally. This fee structure is part of that same effort to formalise how complaints and reviews are handled.

What you need to do before the appeal deadline

If you want to appeal a technical committee’s report, there’s now a strict payment window to follow:

1. Submit your request to form an appeals committee, along with the KD 200 fee requirement.
2. Wait for official notification that your appeal has been accepted.
3. Pay the KD 200 fee within 30 days of that notification.
4. If you miss the 30-day window, your appeal becomes invalid – meaning it’s treated as if it was never filed.

There’s no mention of any grace period or exception for late payment, so anyone going through this process should treat the 30-day window seriously.

Why Kuwait made this change

The decree was issued under Law No. 70 of 2020, which governs the practice of medicine and related professions, patients’ rights, and health care facilities in Kuwait.

It follows Cabinet approval of fees that were proposed by the Medical Liability Authority itself, along with the authority’s own request about how long people should have to pay appeal fees.

According to the decree, the goal is to standardise the administrative and technical steps tied to the authority’s work, fix clear fees for each type of request, and set one defined timeline for paying appeal fees. Article Three of the decree tells the relevant authorities to put the decision into effect and cancels any earlier rules that conflict with it.

You can find more local news from Kuwait on fees, rules and ministry decisions like this one.

What this means for you

If you’re a doctor, nurse or run a clinic in Kuwait, budget for the KD 20 fee whenever you need an administrative service from the authority or the Health Licensing Department, including simple things like requesting extra copies of a technical report.

If you’re caught up in a medical liability dispute and want to challenge a report’s findings, the KD 200 appeal fee is now fixed and clear. Just don’t let the 30-day payment clock run out once your appeal is accepted, or you’ll have to start the whole process again.

For patients, this mostly means the system handling medical complaints now runs on clearer, published rules rather than case-by-case arrangements. That should, in theory, make the process more predictable for everyone involved.

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