Mass walk-out centres on reinstatement of ‘whistleblowing doctors’
The director of the General Surgery Service at the Amadora/Sintra Local Health Unit (ULS) has resigned and ten surgeons have given in their notices due to the return of two doctors who denounced bad practices within the surgical team.
Contacted by Lusa, the ULS Amadora/Sintra confirmed “the departure of 10 members of the General Surgery Service and the resignation of the current director of the Service with effect from December 31” (ie none of the professionals have stopped working yet).
In other words, the ministry is monitoring the situation, and “efforts are being made” to resolve it.
Should the mass walk-out take place, obviously, there will be ‘constraints’. Speaking to Lusa, Nuno Rodrigues, secretary general of the Independent Doctors’ Union (SIM), referred to the “very large population” served by the hospital, and the lack of general surgery care in general.
Patients who can’t be seen in Amadora/Sintra would have to be sent to other overloaded hospitals, warned Rodrigues – but none of this is necessary yet.
“It’s a complicated and complex situation with no easy solution,” Rodrigues admitted.
Joana Bordalo e Sá , president of FNAM, the National Federation of Doctors), said the hospital board “had promised to solve the problem but has done nothing and is jeopardising surgical care for the population it serves”, while Paulo Simões, president of the Southern Regional Council of the Order of Physicians (Ordem dos Médicos) said everything within the surgical service had been going well “until there was information that the two elements who had left in conflict were intending to return”.
The situation has created “great discomfort”, he said.
The problems hark back to a complicated moment when the two surgeons due to return made official complaints about what they saw as poor surgical practices.
The complaints naturally ‘hit the headlines’ as they involved alleged ‘deaths and mutilations’ in a total of 22 patients. However, a final report softened the scandal, saying it could only identify one case of bad practice, and various cases where bad decisions were made, but procedures carried out correctly.
The two whistleblowing doctors were reportedly ostracised by certain team members and moved sideways, for a time – but that time has now run its course, and they have both indicated that they intend to return.
Source material: LUSA
