Firefighters have once again delayed charging hospitals to store stretchers in emergency departments.

This Thursday, firefighters decided to postpone charging hospitals for maintaining stretchers in emergencies and expressed the hope that critical situations would be resolved by Easter, the president of the League of Portuguese Firefighters said.

Speaking to journalists after a meeting with the Executive Directorate of the National Health Service (DE-SNS) and INEM in Porto, António Nunez named a number of dates for upcoming meetings with several people responsible for the field of emergency care in hospitals and used the word “meeting” to sum up meeting, which lasted about three hours.

“There was such a detachment [de cobrança de taxas] because there was an agreement between the three. We want the patient to be treated well (…). There is a commitment to mobilize more ambulances, improve the relationship between Saúde24 and us, improve communication and DE-SNS will organize emergencies (…). We have a commitment that all problems will be resolved by Easter,” said the president of the League of Portuguese Firefighters (LBP).

The next meetings are already scheduled for February 2 with INEM, February 26 with DE-SNS and March 27 with both (DE-SNS and INEM).

This Thursday’s meeting comes after the first meeting that LBP had with the executive management of the National Health Service, also in Porto, on the 9th.

The LBP President said that “the voice of the firefighters has been heard” and that I found “highly mobilized people” in DE-SNS and INEM to solve the problem.

“We are not irreconcilable and we saw on the other side a sign of great desire to solve the problem,” he concluded, refuting a speech made at the entrance to the meeting when he raised the possibility that firefighters would stop transporting discharged patients from the hospital if demands were not met.

“The suspension of the duty is understandable. If the other side is trying to find management measures, this may give the opposite signal. We are not stubborn,” he said.

Also before entering the meeting, António Nunez said that he would propose to DE-SNS a stretcher identification system using a locator to prevent them from getting lost on different floors and corridors of hospital departments.

Regarding this aspect, at the exit António Nuns said that the proposal will be analyzed, but stated that he understands that this is a measure for which each of the hospitals is responsible.

This is one of nine measures presented by the LBP, which Antonio Nunez believes will have a short-term effect.

“I am confident that the nine measures will be implemented by Easter,” he said.

As for the most problematic areas, António Nunez, who last week added the problems of Setubal and Portalegre to the metropolitan areas of Lisbon and Porto, today concentrated his takeover on the Setubal peninsula.

“We are going to create a commission and we are going to have bilateral meetings to improve communications. What is structurally more difficult is Setúbal,” he said.

In this regard, without naming names, António Nunez compared “the central hospital, which has 57 stretchers, which can provide assistance in all emergencies and does not require seven hours of waiting, and the hospital, which has 119 stretchers and a waiting time of 20 hours” .

“That means it’s a management problem. We cannot continue to fund SNS and that was also clear,” he said, adding that INEM’s reimbursement table would be changed.

On the 8th, LPB approved charging hospitals to store ambulance stretchers in emergency departments.

On the same day, Health Minister Manuel Pizarro found it incomprehensible that hospitals had not found a system to avoid storing firemen’s stretchers.

Across the country, fire departments operate 450 ambulances to provide pre-hospital care.

DE-SNS sent clarification later in its statement.