The Social Democratic Party in the Algarve, sensing some easy-to grab political Brownie points, said today that the accusations of the three service directors who resigned from Faro hospital are "serious," and has demanded explanation and investigation.The doctors who quit, claimed that the hospital's management had tried to pressure them into discharging patients early so as to free up beds for incoming patients. This is according to the Independent Medical Association’s regional chief, Jorge Roque da Cunha.
The accusations were denied by the board of the University Hospital of the Algarve but the Socials Democrats commented today that early discharges put patients’ recovery and lives at risk, albeit using the word, "allegedly" when describing the doctors’ reasons for resigning, saying only that for older patients, early discharge would be, "an intolerable cruelty and would violate principles of equality and humanism to which our society can never detach itself."
The PSD-Algarve says that the reasons given for the medics' resignations are likely to be true, as the reasons, "are not, as you might think, the result of occasional cases", but rather "the rule, since the supply of emergency consultations and services has greatly reduced in the last year and inpatient services are overcrowded.”
The Algarve Social Democrats point out that in 2015, there were an average of five emergency admissions per day, which rose to seven in 2016 and to 25 last year, "which is why, as we have seen, patients are hospitalised in unfit conditions on stretchers in the hospital corridors."
"It is clear that the hospital structure in the Algarve is constantly overcrowded. Population growth, tourism growth and aging will only exacerbate this situation.
"This can only be resolved by the construction of a new central hospital, which the government has postponed," says the PSD Algarve, omitting to mention that the last PSD-led government also refused to commission a new hospital.
The PSD-Algarve, concluded today’s lesson in political opportunism by expressing the hope that "the government will strengthen the number of doctors and nurses, ensuring that they fill vacancies in various specialties, solve the degradation of basic emergency services and reduce waiting times which have increased over the last two years."
See also (Feb 28th): 'Top level resignations at Faro Hospital over patient care issues'
