Health || Of the 210 new jobs opened up last summer amid much media publicity, only 28 have so far been filled. It’s a systemic problem and one that no-one seems to be able to fix. The bottom line is that doctors simply don’t want to work in the Algarve.
Algarve hospital boss Dr Pedro Nunes has repeatedly tried to explain the issue, saying the only real way round it is for hospitals to be allowed to pay incoming medical professionals more per hour than the salaries they would receive elsewhere.
“This is something no one was prepared to sort out years ago, when the economic situation was a great deal easier,” he told RTP news. “The problem in Portugal is that doctors concentrate in areas like Lisbon, Porto and Coimbra, where there are the largest Faculties and populations. This means peripheral areas like the Algarve, Évora, Beja, Trás-os-Montes and Beira Interior are all lacking in doctors.”
Talking as health minister Paulo Macedo was due to open up new vacancies for the Algarve, Nunes said there were only two ways of turning the situation round.
“Either the minister allows hospitals to pay more per hour, or he will have to oblige professionals to come here by not opening up vacancies elsewhere.”
But, so far, this has not happened – and the Algarve is therefore still bearing the brunt.
A report on Correio da Manhã last week shows that hospital waiting lists in the Algarve are also much higher than they are elsewhere, for exactly the same reasons. In Faro, for instance, people can wait as many as six months for an outpatient consultation (in Portimão the average time is four months), and the wait “is much higher in specialities like neurology”.
For its part, the health ministry says it will “continue to open up vacancies in various specialities in a bid to reinforce” the Algarve’s medical team and improve the service to patients.
