Heads of the emergency internal medicine team at the San Francisco Xavier Hospital in Lisbon resigned collectively in a letter sent this Monday to the board of directors, criticizing the lack of solutions to the service’s problems.
In a letter signed by 16 paramedics from the Centro Hospitalar Lisboa Central (CHLO) Department of Internal Medicine, accessed by the Lusa agency, the doctors say the crisis being experienced by the General Emergency Service (SUG) is “outdated and has worsened in recent years.”
However, in view of the aggravation of the problems, “with an impact on the delivery of excellent care to patients who use this service, and given the inertia” of the management of the emergency department and the administration of the hospital center, the signatories of the letter now announce his resignation in its entirety from his duties as head and deputy Internal Medicine Team Leader, General Emergency Services, starting Wednesday.
Last July, the vast majority of the subscribers announced their departure as they felt the team was not adequately secured to guarantee the schedule for the month of August.
The doctors say in a letter, which was also sent this Monday to the Order of Physicians and trade unions, that at the time negotiations had begun with the current board of directors “with a view to finding solutions that would eliminate the deficiencies identified.”
“Over the past seven months, despite the willingness of the Hospital Assistants (AH) group of internal medicine to cooperate with the institution they represent, no structural changes have been proposed or implemented, so the problem that motivated the previous message has escalated. as expected, ”says the letter sent by the experts.
Doctors say that in addition to the previously reported problems, there is now another one, which concerns the lack of internal medicine paramedics to form general emergency teams.
Therapists express concern about the composition of these teams and the development of associated scales, emphasizing that they provide inpatient services (including inpatient services and intermediate care units), day hospital, outpatient consultations, in addition to filling in internal urgency scales, often on an emergency basis.
“In this sense, with the frequent use of emergency shifts, it is expected that it will not be possible to fill the SUG scales in the summer months, when most paramedics will work the 150 hours of overtime that may be assigned to them. “, warning.
They also consider it “reprehensible and discriminatory” to provide medical care exclusively at night and on weekends compared to what happens to other medical specialties.
“The presence of these specialties ceased during these periods, which affected the normal functioning of the GMS,” which represents an additional burden for internal medicine in the emergency department.