Not enough doctors in the Saint Margaret Hospital: standby duty ordered

Labour shortage is severe in the Hungarian hospitals and the summer holiday even worsens the situation. For example, in the Saint Margaret Hospital (Budapest), there are no gastroenterologists, so the director ordered standby duty in order to provide service for patients having acute haematemesis or internal haemorrhaging.

According to the letter written by the hospital’s director, since there are no gastroenterologists in the institution at present, they are going to introduce a new policy for patients with acute haematemesis or internal haemorrhaging – index.hu reported. This is because even though it is not among the duties of the hospital to provide care for such patients, but there can be problems with those already being cured in the institution.

Based on the new policy, in those cases when there is a suspicion of haematemesis or internal haemorrhaging and the patient is moveable, they

should be transported to the Honvédkórház

(Hungarian Armed Forces Medical Centre – Budapest). In cases when the situation is so bad that the patient cannot be moved, stabilisation is the duty of the physician in attendance. Provided that there is a need for surgery, the Department of Surgery should be informed. After the patient is stabilised, they should be transported to the Honvédkórház.

If the internal bleeding has to be stopped in the Saint Margaret Hospital, the physician in attendance

has to summon gastroenterologist as soon as possible.

Index.hu wrote its questions regarding the issue a week before to the hospital, and the institution answered that in their name the National Healthcare Services Center would answer. However, nothing happened, so they published their article.

Henceforward, the director of the hospital, Szabolcs Badacsonyi, replied. He wrote that even though it is not among their tasks to provide care for patients with acute haematemesis or internal haemorrhaging, they have been organizing a standby duty for years. He wrote his letter only to make it clear what the task of each department is in a vis maior situation.

According to him, though

the number of gastroenterologists working in the hospital has recently decreased

they still have five with a bar exam, and there are three residents, as well. At fall, two more specialists are planned to come so they will be able to provide care for their patients.

Mr Badacsonyi said that the colleague of theirs who turned to the media with his letter misunderstood its content or interpreted it deliberately false. 

Labour shortage is present in almost every sector of the Hungarian economy. If you want to read about the only place in Békés county where there is inpatient dermatology, but it closed for two weeks because the only doctor went on holiday and it cannot operate with only two resident physicians, click HERE.

HERE you can find a general article about the labour shortage in the Hungarian health-care sector.

Source: index.hu