Prague, Aug 30 (CTK) – The Czech association of general practitioners has declared the state of jeopardised primary healthcare and is planning protests including the closure of GPs’ offices in September, the association head Vaclav Smatlak told CTK yesterday.
The association’s leaders will decide on details of the protests on September 12, he said.
Health Minister Svatopluk Nemecek (Social Democrats, CSSD) rejected the GPs’ criticism and called their threats irresponsible towards patients.
The GPs point out that hospitals will receive money from the state to raise their staff’s wages by 10 percent next year, while outpatient surgeries will see no such increase.
In addition, lawmakers want to pass a bill binding outpatient doctors to serve in hospitals as a form of training, to which the GPs are opposed.
The planned introduction of obligatory hospital service as a form of doctors’ training has also been rejected by pediatricians, outpatient specialists and the Czech Doctors’ Chamber (CLK).
The GPs say the measure is a pretext to solve the shortage of doctors in selected hospitals. The situation should rather be solved by reducing the number of hospitals and transferring more healthcare to outpatient surgeries, the GPs say.
“If the bill made it through, the Health Ministry would be empowered to order private doctors to help in hospitals, including for free,” said CLK President Milan Kubek.
According to Alena Sebkova, chairwoman of a child practitioners’ association, the introduction of obligatory services in hospital could make outpatient doctors unaccessible for child patients.
A petition against the step has been signed by 105,000 child patients’ parents, Sebkova said.
Nemecek said he considers it “extremely irresponsible” to scare patients by mentioning a collapse, a crisis of or a threat to the healthcare system in a situation where the controversial bill, submitted by lawmakers, has not been discussed yet.
The bill seems to define one of more alternatives of doctors’ training that binds them serve in hospital for two afternoons a month at the most, and definitely not for free, Nemecek said.
The GPs also demand an extension of their powers such as the limited power of medicine prescription.
Furthermore, they want health insurers to raise the basic monthly sum that goes to GPs for each of their patients by 6 percent as of next year and also to raise the prices they pay to GPs for medical care.
