VENICE – (al.va.) At school, to specialize in general medicine. But also already at work, so as to be able to operate in the medical guards, in personnel replacements and also in the Usca, so as to meet the need for new white coats. The training-work path for doctors specializing in general medicine was decided by the Veneto regional council. Another provision approved at Palazzo Balbi, on the other hand, extends the temporary and exceptional provisions on primary care and continuity of care, providing for the possibility, on a voluntary basis, of increasing the maximum number of patients for each general practitioner from 1,500 to 1,800. For those who adhere, a regional integration is envisaged to the annual allowance for the study collaborator equal to 2 euros more than those already foreseen for the assisted person).
THE MOTIVATIONS
«The pandemic – said the regional health councilor, Manuela Lanzarin – has had a significant impact on educational teaching and has made it possible to test new methods in the field. By attending the courses, medical guards, substitutions and a whole series of other professional activities such as those within the USCA have been made compatible. A factor which, together with the chronic shortage of general practitioners, has accelerated the entry into the world of work of the professionals in question”. In July of this year – underlines the councilor – 170 doctors had already been given general medicine assignments, more than a quarter of the students.
«A real breath of fresh air for deficient areas». Which last October were 586 and 209 were covered thanks to temporary assignments assigned to trainees. “377 remain – said Lanzarin – and never as in this historical context is it necessary to make use of doctors attending training school”.
THE FUNDS
The resolution that defines the training structure sets, for the three years underway in the 2021-22 academic year, a loan of 8 million 500 thousand euros to be allocated to the Public Health School Foundation for specific training in general medicine, of which 830,000 euros will be used, thanks to the Pnrr, to pay for 66 additional scholarships to the 240 already financed with the aim of always addressing the shortage of general practitioners. The resolution which instead guarantees the increase in the ceiling for assisted patients, assigns the Ulss of the Veneto, on a temporary and exceptional basis, a total investment of up to a maximum of 29 million euros for the year that has just begun.