The Vila do Bispo Health Centre’s computer system, which has been down since October 28th, will finally be back in operation "sometime this week," revealed the Algarve Regional Health Administration (ARS).
The breakdown was a result of a power outage, "motivated by some bad weather on the 28th". Since then, and for about three weeks, coming up to a month, the health centre has been completely without a computer system, which has led to appointment postponement chaos and the impossibility of performing routine procedures.
An anonymous user of this service, who has been waiting for a doctor's note for weeks to renew her driving license, revealed that the centre has been nothing more than a "web of confusion and complications".
"It is unacceptable that this could happen in this day and age, in a first world EU country”, she added, pointing out that "many elderly people simply do have not had anywhere to turn to.”
The ARS, the entity responsible for primary care in the Algarve, have guaranteed that following the breakdown of the systems “the contingency plan was immediately activated for when these situations occur, we try to provide care normally, but registrations are done manually”.
Thus, despite severe limitations in regards to informatics, the ARS claim that the “Health Centre has been operating at medical, nursing and administrative levels as normal. Day-to-day appointments for acute situations as well as nursing treatments are working normally.” However, this goes against complaints from the public, and yet it’s difficult to look past the ARS’ dubious actions in the past. Who is telling the truth here?
“The broken equipment has already been acquired and replaced by ARS Algarve, and is expected to be assembled during this week”, concluded the ARS.
