After 17 years of waiting, 4 years of construction and an entire year closed, the residents of the Madrid neighborhood of Las Tablas, north of the capital, have found that the long-awaited public clinic opened its doors on December 1 without hardly any health personnel.
It is one of the largest primary care centers in the Community of Madrid: 4,709 square meters and an investment of 13.28 million euros. It is expected to serve more than 37,000 citizens of the northern area of the capital, of which about 25,000 are registered in the neighborhood itself with a health card.
According to Lorenzo Álvarez, president of the Neighborhood Association, "when it opened, a month and a half ago, there was only one doctor and one pediatrician, when it is planned that there will be 10 family doctors, 6 pediatricians, 10 nurses and dental services, physiotherapists and two midwives." The Neighborhood Association has requested an "urgent meeting with the Department of Health so that the plan for the immediate incorporation of the necessary toilets can be presented to us," explains Álvarez. Apparently, there are now 3 doctors in the morning, 2 in the afternoon, a pediatrician and 6 nurses, figures that the Ministry of Health does not confirm.
A spokesperson for the Ministry of Health comments that "tomorrow a sectoral table will be held between the general director of human resources, Miguel Ángel Rodríguez Roiloa, with the unions, in which the lack of personnel in this health center, among others, will be addressed. affairs".
The same source from the Community of Madrid explains to La Vanguardia "that there is a lack of doctors and nurses in the Community of Madrid." And he argues that "in the winter plan it was planned and budgeted to hire 1,800 health workers and only 1,027 could be recruited." In his opinion, "in Spain there is a significant lack of doctors. We have been asking the Government to facilitate this work for five years and there is no way." And he gives as an example that the central government "is not facilitating the paperwork to hire non-EU doctors in public healthcare, so these professionals go to work in private healthcare because it is easier for them."
The Las Tablas outpatient clinic has been opened with almost no health staff and some are forced to work, as is the case of two family doctors and the pediatrician, who have been forced to temporarily practice in this center from the Sanchinarro outpatient clinic, meeting the deadlines. legal through the resolution of November 30, 2023 of the primary care management management by which the professionals provisionally assigned to the new Las Tablas health center were published. That is to say, these professionals have been forced to work in said center until their staff is completed. They don't know if they will stay or return to their previous positions.
Two other pediatricians from the Sanchinarro outpatient clinic were also offered a change, but they have not accepted "because they are not interested in the shifts and the salary they are offered," say sources familiar with the facts. In fact, one of them has lost his place by rejecting the proposal of the Community of Madrid.
Another of the few specialists in the outpatient clinic, María Medina, a nursing technician, comes from the Arroyo de la Medialegua Center, and indicates that "I have a contract until March 31. Afterwards, we don't know what will happen." The two administrators who work at the counter "come from the Community of Madrid job board," explains the president of the neighborhood association.
For Lorenzo Álvarez "there is a lot of misinformation." In his opinion, "the neighbors who come to the center do not admit them under the pretext that they will receive an SMS or change notice." The management of the Community of Madrid has prohibited residents of the neighborhood from being able to request a doctor by free choice in this clinic, except for those newly registered.
The Ministry of Health assures that 40% of those affected have been notified via SMS or by telephone call; but the criteria used are unknown because it is not in the streets. There are neighbors in the same block who have received the notice and others No. Some neighbors report that they have received the SMS with the name of the family doctor assigned to them by the Community of Madrid and then it turns out that said doctor does not work at the center. Or what happened to a family, who prefers to stay in the center. anonymity, "we went to visit the child with the pediatrician because we had received the SMS that we had a new doctor assigned and a family doctor attended to us because there was no pediatrician that day." Apparently, the neighbors of Las Tables that live closer, but the criteria are not yet clear.
Carolina Pérez, family doctor and person responsible for risk prevention at Amyts, the majority union among doctors, denounces that the Ministry of Health "has completely ignored all the regulations that exist for doctors with a position in property to provide professionals with this center, since some from Sanchinarro on an afternoon shift have requested a morning shift and have not been granted it. And others have been forced to work there.
Furthermore, he reports that despite being a new and recently opened center "deficiencies have been detected in the infrastructure, such as the lights in the waiting rooms being turned off as a measure of energy efficiency and the doctor hardly seeing if there are patients; the "cytotoxic waste room does not have ventilation or the lockers had been planned to be in the middle of the hallway." In addition, more than half of the center cannot be accessed, so barriers have been placed. Since there are no professionals, the entire physiotherapist, dentistry or gynecology area is strictly closed to citizens.
