A new law has suddenly made it impossible for doctors who work in the both the state health system and privately to refer private patients to the state system for surgery.
The change is one of a number of ‘new strategies’ designed to stop ways in which the state system has found itself ‘corrupted’ (or, in the government’ ‘s words “shown fragilities”). Only recently stories of how a dermatologist managed to earn vast sums of money performing surgeries (on the state) that he had referred there himself, when working in a private capacity, showed the extent of compromise that the SNS has been under.
Equally, waiting lists for surgeries are (perennially) vast. In October last year (the latest available data) there were 274,000 people waiting for SNS surgeries, of which 82,000 had exceeded what is called “Maximum Time for a Guaranteed Response”.
By issuing this new law, the government has effectively ensured that waiting list pressure will plummet. It doesn’t mean the number of people requiring surgeries will fall: just that the situation will look much better on paper as people will be faced with more than the usual number of obstacles to ‘reach’ a surgical waiting list.
The law covers doctors with SNS work contracts, as well as those who work for the system as agency doctors.
There is a clause that adds that any doctors “who do not comply” with these new rules will be the subject of disciplinary proceedings, and the surgeries/ treatment will not be paid by the state health system.
Equally, doctors who are eligible to refer patients for their first hospital specialist consultations/ place them on waiting lists for surgery or therapeutic procedures, and organise lists of patients registered for consultations, surgery and/ or therapeutic procedures, must submit a public declaration of interests and links on an annual basis.
This annual declaration must identify all employment, professional and remuneration links with affiliated entities in the private and social sectors, and its absence or falsification will prevent the doctor from participating in clinical acts, referrals and/ or registrations within the SNS surgical system, known by the initials SINACC.
Source material: Correio da Manhã/ Jornal de Notícias
