The Minister of Health spoke on Saturday about the “phenomenon” of doctors who, during the program at the state, actually work privately. Alexandru Rogobete announced that on Sunday, February 22, the Control Body of the Minister of Health will be at the Elias Hospital.
The claims come a day after the minister flagged the case of a doctor employed in both the public and private systems who performed surgical work at a private facility during state working hours.
“Doctor is not the subject, but the phenomenon itself”
On Saturday evening, Alexandru Rogobete returned to the subject, in an intervention on Digi24.
“For almost seven months now, I have been saying publicly, I am trying to put some pressure on the system to reduce this phenomenon. It is obvious that it does not work only with good words and this is the reason why I will trigger a rather extensive national control through which we want to check all these activities and if the activity is doubled during the daytime program, both in public and in private, for the same person. The doctor is not the subject, but the phenomenon itself, the fact that, as I said, I do not want the doctor to choose between public and private, or public or private. I have always said that medicine is a profession with certain particularities and that the doctor, according to the work schedule in the public system, can carry out his activity.”
The minister explained why the phenomenon is not one that can be overlooked, stating that such situations do not “nothing to do with good faith“.
“The phenomenon is important and I’ll tell you why: because if a doctor during the state program, for which he is paid, does not actually provide medical services in the public hospital, that hospital does not collect from the National Health Insurance House. And from here arise those eternal problems that we know, namely that the contract with the House is not carried out. The hospital signs a contract with the National House in a ceiling that is not carried out. Why is it not carried out? Because it is not offered services. By not offering services, a minus appears in the hospital’s budget that we have to cover from the state budget. Hence the importance of this topic, namely the observance of the working schedule. The fact that he operated at 12:00 already in the private hospital shows that he was there from 8:40, which was confirmed to me by the private hospital.” the official explained.
“You can only go on leave if the management of the health unit approves your leave”
Alexandru Rogobete specified that the doctor did not, in fact, have the leave approved, in order to use this excuse, invoked previously:
“Yes, you see, this is actually the practice. They are covered by these papers, but which are worthless because the legislation says very clearly: you can only go on leave if the management of the health unit approves your leave. Either that leave was somewhere in the office, it was not submitted to the human resources service, so it had no way of being approved. Please, it’s a practice we know.”
Asked if there are many doctors in this situation, the minister replied:
“It’s hard to give you a figure. It is a phenomenon. I don’t want to generalize, obviously there are honest people in the health system who, unfortunately, are affected, whose image is actually affected by such behaviors that have nothing to do with good faith. But yes, there is a phenomenon and we are trying and I want now to strengthen the legislation as much as possible.“
Alexandru Rogobete stated that a first control will take place on Sunday.
“Tomorrow the control body will be at the Elias Hospital, from where we will have a full report”said the minister.
The case came to the attention of the Minister of Health after the publication of a video on the page of a private health unit, in which a doctor also employed at a public hospital explains that, at 12:00, on a Thursday, he was preparing for the second surgical intervention. The explanation was that he was on vacation.
However, the Ministry of Health requested the management of the public hospital about the leave situation for the month of February, and the answer refuted the doctor’s arguments.
In parallel, the private health unit would have confirmed that the doctor performed two surgeries on the same day, at 08:40 and at 12:45, which, according to the minister, confirms his presence in the operating room during the state program.
