The National Federation of Doctors (FNAM) calls for the repeal of legislation that changed the economic incentive metrics for family doctors in health centers and rules that can increase the number of users per doctor.
In a statement, the FNAM indicated that it met with the Portuguese Association of General and Family Medicine (APMGF), “to discuss common concerns about the future of the National Health Service (NHS)on the operation of health centers” with the entry into force at the beginning of the year of the new legislation on Family Health Units (USF) and Local Health Units (ULS).
The FNAM wants this legislation to be repealed in favor of “maintain the autonomy of primary health care” It is “new solutions that dignify the SNS.”
The union structure defends that the new methodology for calculating salary supplements “makes doctors uncomfortable in their clinical practicesince it calls into question the quality of the care provided, as well as the technical-scientific independence of the professionals, entering into conflict with ethical principles and social justice.”
The financial incentive metric, called the Team Performance Index, now takes into account the prescription of medications and complementary diagnostic tests.
The FNAM also criticizes the new User Complexity Index, which could lead to lists of users by family doctor, “which are already oversized,” can “grow even more.”
“This instrument, ethically and socially questionable, considers that there are users who weigh less than one or even ‘zero user’ on the family doctor’s list, using characteristics such as gender, nationality, economic condition, whose construction harms humanity. Therefore, if the User Complexity Index (UCI) is applied, accessibility to family doctors will worsen,” warns the federation.
Finally, the union confederation considers that the The new ULS came into operation “without any strategic vision” and “compromising the autonomy of the FSU”as well as a preventive vision of medicine, which now focuses on hospitals and disease.
Source: Observadora
