The Emergency Service of the Hospital del Sureste, in Arganda del Rey, is on the verge of collapsing due to management that has plunged the hospital center into chaos. As reported by the Workers’ Commissions (CC.OO.) to La Vanguardia, half of the workforce has “fled” from the poor working conditions they have endured for more than two years. The lack of personnel brings this medical facility to the brink of closure despite the fact that it serves 200,000 inhabitants.
As reported by CC.OO., and endorsed by the Amyts union, the workers who have left the Hospital found the overload of care and work hours to which they have been continuously subjected for 24 months to be “unbearable”. For this reason, they detail that between May and August seven doctors resigned from their jobs, while in September eight other doctors did so, so that only 12 of the 25 that the service had were left, and those who “resist” fear “not endure psychological stress.”
The concatenation of casualties and the lack of personnel have caused “a clear reduction in presence” in the October staff, which, according to the doctors, “makes adequate clinical practice unfeasible.”
The union also disgraces that the Hospital management has chosen to “relieve” the care burden by “distributing an information leaflet” to citizens who arrive at the service, and in which it informs them that if their pathologies are not urgent “the delay in attention can exceed six hours.”
Next, according to the union, users are told six health centers with Primary Care Continuing Care Points (PAC) where they can go, although “some of these PACs also do not have a doctor,” laments CCOO.
For their part, sources from the Ministry of Health have acknowledged in statements to Efe that since last May they have “progressively” registered several sick leave of doctors because some have decided to continue their professional work in other hospitals, others have moved on to care centers. Primary and others have emigrated to other countries.
In addition, they defend that they have offered to hire “reinforcement” health professionals, but they have not been able to fill them “as this is a center that is difficult to cover due to its geographical location.”
Faced with this reduction in physicians, the Hospital has “reorganized the service” and, although “all patients are cared for,” care is “prioritized” to “urgent, emergent and serious” pathologies, which means that those with “pathologies” less serious” may “sometimes see the waiting time increased.”
However, they emphasize that every patient who arrives at the Emergency Department is treated by a nursing professional “in a maximum of five minutes” to establish the degree of their illness, and they conclude that “in no case are they invited, urged or instructed to “They go to other health centers to be treated.”
