Minsa, medical associations and the UP School of Medicine sign an agreement to face the pandemic

Nimay Gonzalez • 14 Ago 2020 – 07:21 PM

This Friday took place the signing of an agreement between authorities of the Ministry of Health (Minsa), leaders of the main medical societies and associations; and the dean of the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Panama (UP), with the aim of joining forces to face the new coronavirus pandemic (COVID-19).

The head of Health, Luis Sucre, explained that during the signing of this document a Coordination Commission for the Clinical Response to the Pandemic was formed, which will be in charge of permanently evaluating the situation of each of the health facilities and must submit a proposal to the Minsa that allows optimizing the performance of the existing national medical human resource, evaluating whether a reorganization strategy of this human resource can be implemented and whether or not it is necessary to incorporate specialized professionals from abroad, according to the needs and epidemiological data of the country.

“For now, we will continue working to organize ourselves with the resources we have in the country, we will continue to appoint general practitioners, which is what we have at our disposal, the associations have committed to finding us professionals from their branch, from their specialty, to reinforce each one of them. the executing units that have been asking us for support with respect to the appointment of these professionals, ”Sucre said.

The associations will deliver to the Minsa the list of all suitable Panamanian professionals, members of the respective societies who are in a position to work permanently or in shifts in the intermediate or intensive care units of patients with or without COVID-19.

“Part of the commitment acquired is to guarantee the Panamanian human resource and in this sense the associations committed to summon professionals to reinforce the executing units that request the appointment of specialists in Critical Medicine, Cardiology, Pulmonology, Emergency Medicine and Family Medicine”, indicated the representative of the National Negotiating Medical Commission (Comenenal), Domingo Moreno.

If the hiring of foreign doctors becomes necessary, the Technical Health Council must evaluate the academic degrees and pensum, with the support of the University of Panama and always under the supervision of designated Panamanian doctors, who must make biweekly reports on their performance.

The University of Panama will design during this weekend the program for training through virtual courses of general practitioners, both in clinical management of patients with COVID-19 and care for chronic diseases, ventilators and life support techniques, in order that they can support the specialists in these units.

“The most important conclusion of this historic meeting between the Minister and the representatives of the specialist medical societies that are in the first line of response to the pandemic, has been to establish this unit of clinical coordination of patient care on stage hospitable. Weekly meetings will be held so that the evolution of the pandemic can be monitored, the needs of the health system can be appreciated and the capacity can also be evaluated regarding the number of health professionals at this time ” , highlighted the dean of the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Panama, Enrique Mendoza.

For their part, the medical authorities undertook to carry out the corresponding steps, in order to cancel within 30 days what was owed to the doctors for shifts worked.

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