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Remember to pay your Kela healthcare fee in time!

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Healthcare

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YTHS / FSHS

FSHS (Finnish Student Health Service), or YTHS (Ylioppilaiden terveydenhoitosäätiö) in Finnish, is the main healthcare service for those studying for a Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in a Finnish institution of higher education. The closest is FSHS clinic is in Otaniemi, Otakaari 12, but you can use any of them.

FSHS provide a range of services, and their areas can be found here, which includes general, mental and oral health. Clinicians can also refer you to specialist if necessary.

Before you can use the services provided by FSHS, your need for treatment will be assessed, which can be done through one of their forms in the Self online service (limited in scope), the SelfChat chatting service, or by phone. This assessment can grant you a booking permission or book an appointment for you.

**Self** is the online service provided by FSHS. Here you can fill out the aforementioned forms and use SelfChat, and can be used to book appointments if you have a booking permission, and reschedule or cancel booked appointments.

Appointments are free (unless you forget to show up), but you have to pay a fee of around 35 euros per semester to Kela, the government agency for social benefits, found here. The deadline for the autumn semester is November 15th and for spring March 15th.

You are exempt from the fee if you have social security coverage in another EU, EEA, country, Switzerland, Great Britain or Northern Ireland, but you’ll have to send a picture of your insurance card before the fee deadline and bring it to any FSHS appointments.

Public Healthcare

As a resident of Espoo, you have access to public municipality healthcare, which for us is the Western Uusimaa Wellbeing Services County (LUVN), and has similar services to FSHS. Although not free, it is very affordable and much cheaper than private options.

For more specialized public healthcare is the Hospital Distict of Helsinki and Uusimaa (HUS), which has a range of departments and laboratories across Helsinki, which you may be referred to for tests, including scans and bloodwork.

Private Healthcare

Helsinki has a wide range of private health clinics, and their services are much more expensive than the public ones, but will be quicker and more diverse. Under certain conditions Kela can reimburse some of the cost of a private clinic visit, details here.

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Mental Health & Wellbeing

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Public Services

Both student healthcare, FSHS, and local public healthcare, LUVN, offer services related to mental health and have professionals to help you with mental health issues. Details for LUVN bookings are here, and for FSHS you can follow the booking methods mentioned above.

University Services

The university provides several opportunities to aid your wellbeing while at Aalto. In regards to study in career matters, there are many staff to help you with any matter, including study and career psychologists, and study and academic advisors, the comprehensive list is here.

For more personal matters, the university has two chaplains, who you can discuss any matter with, related to work, personal relationships or life situations, irrespective of religion or worldview, and ave a strict confidential obligation. You can book a meeting or visit during their drop in times, details here.

The Starting Point of Wellbeing page has drop in times for the chaplains, counsellors and psychologists, as well as details about them and organizations that focus on well being.

The undergraduate center has a slient room dedicated to meditation, prayer or just calming down at M135, details here.

Organizations

There are also a couple organizations dedicated to mental health. First is Mieli ry, which offers crisis counseling in Finnish, Swedish, English, and others languages through an interpreter. They have a crisis helpline for each language, details here. They also offer peer support groups, and chats (both only in Finnish). Their webpage. Second is Nyyti ry which is dedicated specifically to students. For Finnish speakers they have chats, groups discussions and webinars, and for English speakers they have chats chats at least once a month, and webpages about various topics.

Data Guild

Also remember that you can talk to a tutor about anything on your mind regarding studies or life situations. 😊 We’re a diverse bunch and have through many different situations, and will likely relate to many of your own struggles related to starting your university studies.

We also have events focused on wellbeing, such as sports events and chill hangouts!

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Sport & Wellbeing Associations

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You’re lucky, Aalto has a plethora of associations that are sport- and wellbeing-oriented! We combined the most famous ones in a separate page, visit it here!

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Important Phone Numbers