READ CATALAN VERSION
The Department of Health makes a positive assessment of the Plan to improve citizens' accessibility to health care, which was launched a year ago. The objective was to reduce waiting lists for access to a specialist, diagnostic test or surgical intervention. For the Minister of Health, Manel Balcells i Díaz, "the situation before the pandemic has been recovered." “Today we are better in all aspects compared to 2019; We have, therefore, overcome the pandemic and the post-pandemic,” he stressed.
In fact, the figures indicate that the percentages of people on the waiting list for a surgical intervention that have been resolved within the deadline have improved in 2023 compared to the previous year, being the best data collected since records are available. Oncology has remained at 99%, cardiac surgery has gone from 99% to 100%, guaranteed surgery from 90% to 97% and, finally, the rest of surgeries from 92% to 97%.
The resolution time for a surgical intervention varies depending on its type: oncology between 45 and 60 days; cardiac 90 days; those guaranteed (cataracts, hip prosthesis and knee prosthesis) 180 days, and the rest, 365 days. The year 2023 closed with 39,000 more interventions compared to 2022, which is 11% more, and late surgical interventions were reduced by 61%.
Salut will now focus on improving access to visits to primary care centers. With this purpose, Salut will implement the tool called scheduling for reasons throughout Catalonia. The platform, "very interactive and very well developed", has been tested as a pilot plan in 2023 in 14 primary care teams distributed throughout the territory, and "has shown very good results", as explained by Minister Balcells.
The tool identifies 285 possible reasons for consultation to define the waiting time, depending on the urgency. “There are reasons that should allow prioritizing those who need to be visited within 24 hours, more quickly (in the case of someone who has a fever), and those who can wait a few days, 3-5 days (in the case of someone who has had back pain since a few months ago)”, Balcells detailed. For the head of Salut, this system also guarantees that the person is treated by their usual doctor, which is essential for patient monitoring.
The Plan to improve citizen accessibility to health care measures the experience of accessing the system. In the section of visits to the specialist, during 2023 late visits were reduced by 12%.
The year 2023 closed with 165,000 more diagnostic tests compared to 2022, 21% more, and late diagnostic tests were reduced by 30%.
Regarding visits to primary care centers, two out of every three people have had an appointment in 5 days or less.
In achieving these figures, the counselor has pointed out two important factors: the effort made by professionals throughout the system and the economic investment of the Plan of 100 million euros, which will remain structural to consolidate the improvements in accessibility to the system. .
The degree of global satisfaction of citizens with the care received has increased by 0.35 points, going from 7.37 in 2022 to 7.72 in 2023, according to the latest User Perception, Experience and Satisfaction Survey Plan ( PLAENSA).
Regarding the personal treatment that users receive from doctors, it is rated satisfactorily at 93.1% and that of nurses at 94.8%. Likewise, citizens value 94.1% of the explanations they receive from primary care professionals.
