Quick swabs with the general practitioner: there is an agreement
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Chiavari – There is a signature: the agreement has been reached. General practitioners will be able to perform rapid swabs on asymptomatic patients. Asl 4 has identified the locations and, barring unforeseen circumstances, everything should materialize from next week. In fact, the premises are not yet active but as soon as they become active, the health company makes it known that it will communicate it extensively. However, they can already be found by consulting the ASL website (www.asl4.liguria.it): in Chiavari, in the outpatient building on the ground floor, in the Sestri Levante hospital on the first floor, in Rapallo from the hospital’s First Intervention Point, in Moneglia from the Blue Cross, in Casarza Ligure from the Green Cross, and in the health centers of Borzonasca, Cicagna and Rezzoaglio.
The general manager Bruna Rebagliati confirms the importance of the agreement signed with general practitioners, «whose collaboration, more and more in this dramatic moment of pandemic emergency, is fundamental. The signed agreement expands the range of services offered by doctors to the patients in the area of the ASL 4, and will allow to increase the supply of tampons throughout the territory ».
Antonio Zampogna provincial secretary of the Italian Federation of General Practitioners clarifies that it will not be possible to present oneself freely in hospitals: “It is necessary that the doctor identifies the patient who has had contact with a positive subject and addresses him, through a reservation, in the locations identified where performed the quick swab, which among other things it is not necessary to do in the first few days because it risks not being valid – he specifies – it is more likely that positivity will manifest itself five to eight days after any contact ».
The result is immediate: just wait about a quarter of an hour and you will have the result. Currently, about thirty doctors have joined, 25% of the ASL 4 professionals. “We do not have direct knowledge of the number of tampons available, but there will be enough for everyone – Zampogna integrates – The project will now end next Thursday 31 December but the agreement provides for the possibility to extend it, if necessary, as indicated by the Ministry of Health ”.
The project signed by the doctors together with the Region, the ASL and the participating pediatricians, is also interesting from the point of view of better care for Covid patients but not only. Meanwhile, a system that could soon be extended to the Levant starts with Professor Matteo Bassetti (director of Infectious Diseases of the San Martino Hospital in Genoa) from ASL 3:Telematic assistance is provided with infectious disease specialists who can consult with doctors about the best patient care that can be followed from home. We already in a “friendly” way consult with our precious ASL 4 infectious diseases – Zampogna continues – and I hope that soon, compatibly with the resources available, this new path can also be concretely structured ».
The signed agreement also includes a second important step, namely the creation of an IT system to update patient data, being able to consult them in sharing: “Let’s think about how nice it would be, for example, on a hospitalized patient we are monitoring, to be able to count on constant updating, and to receive data on the medical record of the doctor who is in charge, who would be informed to three hundred and sixty degrees on the course of the disease and his state of health ”, adds the provincial secretary of the Fimmg.
In the meantime, a few hundred doses of influenza vaccines have finally arrived, after the alarm raised by doctors who were no longer able to meet the requests, this year on the rise. They are not as many as would really be needed for the population of the Levant, but at least doctors can continue to administer them to patients who have already been booked for some time, giving priority to those over sixty-five, and to the so-called at-risk categories.
According to Zampogna, it would take “a few thousand for the whole ASL 4”, and the hope is that they will still arrive, given that there is time until the end of December to get vaccinated against seasonal flu. Recently, the general practitioners had to cancel the reservations of several patients, because the vaccines were finished, now we can proceed again: “We hope to really make up for it, because there are so many reservations, throughout this month of November, and this year, also for the Covid-19 emergency, people who usually never required vaccinations want to get vaccinated – he adds – What we regret is having to divert our patients to ASL in search of a reservation to get the vaccine.
The situation is more complex this year, but as always we must prioritize age and more fragile categories – he specifies – then we must reserve them for those who had put themselves on the list in advance, “he adds.
Reservations actually fill GPs’ agendas until the end of December. Thirty-three thousand vaccines were administered last year, this year doctors estimate to exceed fifty thousand. Now we await the arrival of the last part. The health company had ordered another five thousand doses. It is possible to book the vaccine through the unique regional Cup Liguria toll-free number: 800/098543.
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