District: ULS Alto Minho open to dialogue regrets blackmail and threat of emergency termination | Newspaper C

ULS Alto Minho said today that it remains open to dialogue with emergency doctors in Monção and Ponte de Lima, regretting the “tone of blackmail and threat of disruption of services” that guided the meetings already held.

In a written response to a request for clarification from the Lusa agency, the board of directors of the Alto Minho Local Health Unit (ULSAM) said that “from moment zero it showed total availability for dialogue, having in particular met with the coordinator responsible for Basic Emergency Service (SUB) schedules [Monção e Ponte de Lima] and have presented a proposal”.

“The board of directors regrets that all communication with this body is made in a tone of blackmail and threat of disruption of services, however, in our responses, we continue to request time and availability to talk”, emphasizes ULSAM.

The PSD warned today that doctors at the SUB of Monção and Ponte de Lima intend to refuse overtime from Monday, due to non-payment of supplements agreed, in 2023, with the ULS of Alto Minho.

“Doctors with 95% of medical hours completed in the Basic Emergency Services (SUB) of Monção and Ponte de Lima will prove themselves unavailable to work more hours until supplement payments of an additional 10 euros per hour are formally assumed. to all professionals who worked shifts on holidays and weekends in December and January 1, 2024”, says the PSD district in a statement.

According to the PSD, that amount was agreed with ULSAM to avoid, during those periods, the total closure of services, given the refusal of more than 2,500 doctors to work more than the 150 annual overtime hours to which they are obliged.

In the response sent to Lusa, the ULSAM board of directors guarantees “to remain committed so that, at no time, services to the population are called into question” and reiterates “openness to negotiate, improve working conditions, not only financial, but also through access to training and considering more differentiated teams”.

According to the PSD, doctors “also demand an increase in the base hourly rate to 46.50 euros, retroactive to January 1st”, following the publication, in February, of an order from the Secretary of State for Health “which facilitates the boards of directors of each Local Health Unit (ULS) hire doctors on a service provision basis”.

According to the PSD, this order provides for “a maximum value of up to 40% above the base value/hour of the third remuneration position, in the category of senior graduate assistant (head of service), whose base value of the remuneration table is located, at 2024, at 33.28 euros/hour”.

“Furthermore, the difference paid per hour in other places continues to be unjustified, such as, for example, at Hospital de S. João, where the amount reaches 60 euros per hour on weekend nights”, says the PSD.

ULSAM is made up of two hospitals: Santa Luzia, in Viana do Castelo, and Conde de Bertiandos, in Ponte de Lima.

It also includes 12 health centers, one public health unit and two convalescent units, and serves a resident population of more than 244 thousand people from the ten municipalities in the district of Viana do Castelo, and some neighboring populations in the district of Braga.

More than 2,500 professionals work in all of those structures, including around 500 doctors and more than 800 nurses.

Lusa