Calling it haemorrhage means looking at the issue with discreet optimism. The decline in general practitioners active in the Bergamo area today is drastic: the data say it, Ats says it, the doctors themselves, the mayors and even the patients say it. Seventy-one overall “lost” from 2018 to today have led to a provincial situation that sees the absence of one doctor in five. With consequences on patients and also on colleagues, who today follow 1,500 patients each, but who could see the maximum number of clients raised up to 1,800 and 2,000. If once the problem concerned above all the mountain areas, where the small number of doctors must also be crossed with the kilometers to go to make the visits, today the theme of the lack of General Practitioners (GPs) concerns, without distinction, the whole province. In total, today, only 609 doctors are serving. A figure that has fallen sharply in recent years: just think that in 2018, pre-pandemic, the number stood at 680 units. Even then it was a number lower than the need, which according to an aggregate data provided by Ats stands at 766 units.
To obtain the data relating to the ideal availability divided by territorial area, the Istat data of the resident population over 14 years of age on January 1st was taken into consideration for each municipality of Bergamo ( pediatricians, who are currently 135 in the province of Bergamo, ed). This figure, following the indications of Ats, was then divided by 1,300, the number of patients that, theoretically, any general practitioner could follow. This leads to a result of 729 total doctors. There is therefore a gap between the data identified through this calculation, made with the aim of “weighing” the shortage of doctors in the individual territorial areas, and the official data provided by Ats: this also happens because, in addition to the demographic data, the number of doctors for the province also varies in relation to contractual issues. What emerges is that in some areas up to 20% of doctors are missing compared to the places available. The areas with the best coverage are the Basso Sebino and Grumello, in the valleys the percentages are between 12 and 14% and in the more “urban” areas between 16 and 20%. In the plains and in the Seriate area the most significant deficit, above 20%.
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