BUM – During the pandemic, between 2021 and 2022, had returned to his country of origin and had closed the clinic without notifying the Ulss. Now, a year later, Adesoji Adewale, a 65-year-old general practitioner from Nigeria, has been suspended for six months by the disciplinary council of the Padua medical association. And so all of his patients were suddenly left without their trusted doctor.
We are in Sant’Urbano and Barbona, two of the smallest municipalities in the province of Padua, the first 2,050 souls, the second only 611. And already when the previous general practitioner retired, it was very difficult to find a replacement, because we are in a sparsely populated area, there are no “local” doctors and those who live in Padua do not want to have the clinic so far from the city as a matter of cost and convenience. Thus the news of the suspension of the Nigerian doctor exploded as one bomba in the two villages.
A week of fire, in which all Ulss and the Municipality tried to find a replacement. In the end, the competent health district and the mayors found a solution to cover the entire period of suspension of Adesoji: from Monday he will return to service in the clinics of Barbona and Sant’Urbano Antonietta Roveran, for many years resident in the second Municipality, general practitioner retired.
THE MOTIVATIONS
But why was the Nigerian doctor suspended? The lawsuit originated over a year ago: between 2021 and 2022, when the professional decided to return to Nigeria after a long absence due to the pandemic. He closed theclinic and set off. Furthermore, while he was in Africa, he had some health problems and therefore the trip took longer than expected. The doctor, however, would not communicated to the Ulss that he would be on vacation and that it was therefore necessary to find a temporary replacement. In reality, the doctor, later heard by the Disciplinary Council, assured that he had sent a communication, which however the Ulss would never have received. The fact is that the surgery remained closed, leaving patients uncovered, in a particularly critical period. After a year of phone calls, emails and meetings, the body of the Medical Association finally decided to punish the doctor with a six-month suspension, notified in January and active from 1 March until 31 August.
THE BATT AND ANSWER
However, no one would have warned i mayors of the two countries where the doctor works. So much so that on 3 March a post appeared on the Facebook page of the Municipality of Sant’Urbano which clearly shows the annoyance caused by the matter. “Only a few days ago, the South Padua Health District and the Municipality learned from the Medical Association website that Dr. Adesoji was suspended from 1 March to 31 August 2023. All the doctors contacted so far for a complete replacement, both from District that the municipal administration did not give availability. So much so that Dr. Origbe Ezekiel Ighoakpor made himself available at Villa Estense for emergencies and prescriptions, which however is a long way from the two towns, a unease for the elderly and those without a car.
Yesterday then the mayor’s announcement Francesco Peotta: «We are pleased to announce that the crisis due to the absence of the general practitioner appears to have resolved, after a week. It has been an intense week, in which we tried, first of all, to provide a basic medical service to the citizen users, collaborating with the offices of the Health District, even before abandoning ourselves to sterile controversies for a holiday decided by for notice to local authorities that did not exist. We are happy to have limited the discomfort of users to minimum times and that the difficulties dependent on an institutional short circuit have been overcome, albeit in the well-known difficulty of finding general practitioners available to perform service in this period”.
For its part, the president of the Order, Domenico Crisarà, assures that the provision against the Nigerian doctor, who at the end of the 1990s was also involved in a legal case relating to clandestine abortions, has been well evaluated. «The suspension was decided by the entire commission. And it must also be noted that the doctor did not object. Everyone draws their own conclusions. The order evaluates the behavior deontological for the protection of citizens. The provision was in January and there was plenty of time for him to be notified. We couldn’t do it for privacy reasons. The doctor concerned had to do it. Right from the start I also proposed to come myself to stop the emergency while the replacement was found. In any case, within a week the solution was found».
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in Il Gazzettino