Early this morning, an agreement to stop the deterioration of primary care seemed almost impossible. The PP Health Councilors attended the meeting with the rest of their colleagues from other parties and the Ministry of Health within the Interterritorial Health Council, fuming against almost everything. But after hours of meeting, not only did the blood not reach the river; On the contrary, they left satisfied and with agreements under their arms. The explanation was given by Minister Mónica García: regardless of political issues, all the counselors are concerned about the situation of primary care.
The agreements may seem somewhat abstract to citizens, although behind them may be the beginning of the end of the lack of professionals.
For now, the accreditation conditions of primary care teaching units will be reevaluated in order to increase the number of specialists. To this end, Health has given the communities two weeks to send their proposals on the criteria, which will govern the accreditation of the places, which will then be analyzed in a Human Resources Commission that will be convened within a period of two weeks.
But what is the point of training family doctors if they later decide to leave due to poor working conditions? (“What’s the point of filling the glass if the water then goes through the holes?” asked the minister). Because, according to the data that García provided, 9% of residents in primary care leave during the MIR and between 30 and 90% (depending on the regions), leave when they have finished their training seeing the poor working conditions (it is not both the salary and the impossibility of caring for 60 patients a day or the bureaucratization of their daily lives).
The communities also agree to improve these conditions and work to offer incentives for them to stay (eight communities already offer two-year or permanent contracts when the MIR ends), review the issue of agendas (number of appointments) and debureaucratize their day to day life (Health works on self-discharges for minor illnesses).
They have also agreed that the autonomous communities fill out the State Registry of Professionals “to be able to know where these professionals are.” And, looking ahead to the summer, Health has confirmed that the MIRs that began in September 2020 due to the pandemic will end that month, so during the summer they will be able to work autonomously in consultations, which will help alleviate the deficit. that occurs at that time
