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Date Published: 04/04/2022

ARCHIVED - Calls for the resignation of new management at Torrevieja Hospital

ARCHIVED ARTICLE

Valencia regional government regained direct control of Torrevieja Hospital in the Vega Baja area of Alicante province last October

<span style='color:#780948'>ARCHIVED</span> - Calls for the resignation of new management at Torrevieja Hospital

Just six months after Valencia regional government reclaimed control of Torrevieja Hospital from management company Ribera Salud, the Works Council is calling for the immediate resignation of the new directors.

The council which represents hospital employees is "deeply concerned" about "the current unacceptable situation" and has cited a lack of organisation, pay and communication together with a surge of patient and hospital user complaints.

There were a number of protests and disputes in the run-up to the hand-over on October 15 2021, not least over Ribera's termination of 200 temporary workers' contracts which led to the closure of wards due to a lack of resources. The Ministry of Health reinforced Torrevieja Health Department with 121 health professionals in the first week of a return to normal healthcare activity, followed by "further recruitments", but workers who were "already uneasy throughout the process remain so".

In a statement, the Works Council has argued that since the return to public management, a "very complicated" situation has arisen caused by the "improvisation with which the hand-over took place", and that "after five months it has not been solved".

"The management and its directors have not been able to tackle the many problems that have arisen and have often ignored the duty of communication and negotiation with the works council," continued the statement.

The council also claims that during a meeting with management and the hospital's finance department on Thursday March 31, bosses presented statistics that do not reflect what is actually going on.

"We believe that this management is detached from reality. They talk about statistics but are unaware of the dissatisfaction amongst professionals and users," according to the works council, which added that "never before have we seen the likes of queues that are currently formed by dissatisfied users wanting to make complaints".

The committee claims some staff have been paid "badly for five months", with some employees having had to wait up to three months for their first payment from the Conselleria due to "numerous objections made by the Treasury of Alicante".

"This is totally unacceptable. These professionals provide the best quality care every day and do not receive the remuneration they are entitled to. There is a general lack of doctors in Spain, but in this health department the situation has worsened in recent months due to professionals leaving, and this management and its directors have no idea how to tackle it".

Departments most affected by the flight of doctors are: Emergency, Radiology, Neurology, Dermatology, Pneumology and Urology.

According to the Works Council, the emergency department is going through its worst period in 15 years, with a lack of doctors which has led to an increase in waiting times and "patient absconding", whilst radiology has had to be outsourced for the most part, "causing errors in tests".

"In primary care, we are also experiencing a lack of health professionals and the medical director of primary care resigned a few weeks ago," said the Works Council, which sees this situation worsening with "the arrival of Ukrainian refugees without reinforcements for their care".

For all the above reasons, "this management team has not taken us into account...has failed to address the unease of professionals and the dissatisfaction of users", and as such must resign, demands the workers' committee.

Image: Archive

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