(ANSA) – ROME, MAY 24 – There is an alarm over the shortage of general practitioners (MMGs). On 1 January 2022, “considering acceptable a ratio of 1 for every 1,250 assisted”, a shortage of 2,876 units is estimated and by 2025 more than 3,400 will be lost. Furthermore, 42.1% of family doctors exceed the maximum limit of 1,500 patients, reducing the quality of assistance. This is what emerges from an analysis by the Gimbe Foundation on the critical issues in the rules governing the inclusion of GPs in the National Health Service (NHS), accompanied by an estimate of the extent of the current and future shortage of GPs in the Italian regions.
“The alarm on the shortage of family doctors – says Nino Cartabellotta, president of the Gimbe Foundation – today concerns all the Regions for different reasons: lack of planning, early retirement, doctors with exorbitant numbers of patients and ‘desertification’ in disadvantaged areas that end up to make it impossible to find a GP in the vicinity of the home, with consequent inconvenience and health risks”. The most critical situations due to the shortage of GPs are found in the large northern regions: Lombardy (-1,003), Veneto (-482), Emilia Romagna (-320), Piedmont (-229), as well as in Campania (-349) . The scarcity of family doctors is also reflected in the excessive number of patients per doctor: out of the 40,250 Mgg, 42.1%, according to Agenas data, have more than 1,500 patients, a ceiling established by the National Collective Agreement (ACN) which in particular cases it was increased up to 1,800 and up to 2,000 on the basis of derogations (for example in the Autonomous Province of Bolzano). The limit of 1,500 doctors is exceeded by more than one GP out of two in Campania (52.7%), Valle d’Aosta (58.2%), Veneto (59.8%) and by almost two out of three in the Autonomous Province of Bolzano (63.7%), in Lombardy (65.4%) and in the Autonomous Province of Trento (65.5%).
If then the number of ministerial scholarships for the Specific Training Course in General Medicine, after a period of substantial stability around 1,000 units (2014-2017), subsequently increased, in particular in 2021 (3,406 units) and in 2022 (3,675) thanks to the dedicated resources of the Pnrr, the new MMGs, explains Cartabellotta, “will not be sufficient to fill the generational turnover. In particular, the Enpam estimates that the number of young people trained or starting training in general medicine would occupy only 50% of MMG posts left uncovered by retirements”.
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