Vacancies, are being advertised, plenty of them, but Portugal’s doctors are avoiding the Algarve by taking jobs in the big cities or moving away from the country.
The head of urology at Faro Hospital said that the lack of anaesthetists is generating a reduction of 40% in scheduled operations in this area. In Portimão for those patients waiting for operations the excuse is always the same – no doctors.
An anonymous member of the hospital administration staff at the Algarve Central Hospitals Group admitted to national media yesterday that there are shortcomings as 20 more anaesthetists are needed. Currently there are 17 in Faro where there should be 30, at the Barlavento in Portimão there are 11 where there should be 25.
The shortage is not a recent event as only one doctor left last year for the private sector. The problem is that in the last two years there has been four recruitment programmes to hire anaesthetists to make up the numbers to the required level and only one was hired. Given the demand for operations the anaesthetists have been busy on emergency operations, allowing planned operations to be delayed indefinitely.
The administration of the Hospital of the Algarve, chaired by Dr. Pedro Nunes, has been under criticism for a lack of doctors, materials, drugs and management skills has presented a plan to the NHS to offer financial incentives to attract doctors to unfilled posts. So far there has been no response to this request which would need a budget increase in order to pay above the national scale to attract doctors physicians.
Graduate doctors usually would be employed at basic salary levels to fill the vacancies but they now are going to the big cities or simply emigrating.
The ministry is said to be ‘studying solutions’ to the Algarve’s problems and has backed Pedro Nunes despite obvious shortcomings and an increasing concern from staff amd patient groups that the management and resourcing of the Algarve's health service is not in safe hands.
Algarve Hospitals Director, Dr Pedro Nunes, asserts that there are no problems in the Algarve, the protests will go away if he waits long enough, there are drugs and doctors for all and the Tooth Fairy soon will visit are lacking in credibility.
See also: http://www.algarvedailynews.com/news/1658-portugal-s-doctors-are-emigrating
