BRATISLAVA, December 3, (WEBNOVINY)- Doctors might return to hospitals already on Monday depending on how quickly their new contracts with hospitals will be signed, said the head of the Medical Trade Unions Association (LOZ) Marian Kollar at a news conference on Saturday. LOZ representatives and Prime Minister Iveta Radicova have signed a memorandum on meeting the demands of discontent doctors represented by LOZ. He however instructed doctors to sign exclusively LOZ-okayed contracts that will be brought by a LOZ coordinator. The LOZ said it would not prevent the agreement even if some doctors insisted on their notices and did not want to return to their original workplaces.
LOZ Deputy Chairman Peter Visolajsky urged doctors who went on sick leave to return to hospitals if their health condition enables their comeback. Doctors are thus preparing for meeting their commitments ensuing from the memorandum. However they should sign new contracts only after a LOZ lawyer checks that they include all benefits on which LOZ agreed with the government.
Kollar thanked their colleagues, the Slovak Medical Chamber and patients who according to him were “our players“ despite the last two days when many doctors whose notice period was running off chose to stay at home. The LOZ believes that the government is guilty for getting the situation on the edge. “Health care was not at all facilities sufficient but it was not our fault,“ said Kollar. “We believe that such situation will never repeat and we will not be forced to take such steps again,“ he stated.. According to him competent ones refused serious talks and undervalued the situation until the last days in November. “They did not expect that doctors will resist rough pressure of the society and the media and will withstand,” stated Kollar. Doctors withstood, did not accept the offered thirty pieces of silver, rejected the transformation of hospitals and demanded adequate payments to the health sector, the trade union boss underscored.
According to the memorandum that Prime Minister Iveta Radicova and LOZ signed early morning as of January 1, 2012 wages would come up to 1.05 – 1.6-fold the average wage in the national economy, representing a wage of EUR 807 for non-certified physician and EUR 1,230 for certified doctor. Later on, basic wages would further increase to 1.2- 1.9-fold the average wage as of July 1. As of that data, the salaries would not be lower than EUR 923. The basic wage of certified physician would reach EUR 1,416. Simultaneously, the sum paid for on duty services at hospitals would not change. As of January 1, 2013, the basic salaries would go up to 1.25- to 2.3-fold the average wage, translating into EUR 961 for non-certified doctor and EUR 1,769 for certified physician.
The Medical Trade Unions Association had four demands on the government: to observe the Labor Code, change the system of health care funding, stop transformation of hospitals to joint-stock companies, and increase wages of health care employees. The talks with representatives of the protesting hospital doctors with the government on Wednesday that protracted till late night ended fruitless. As a result, some 1,200 notices lodged by doctors two months ago took effect at midnight and those doctors are no longer employees of the hospitals. Some of those doctors were ordered back to work based on the state of emergency declared in thirteen districts in Slovakia. However, information from many hospitals shows that many of those doctors chose to go on a sick leave instead of returning to their patients.
SITA