For President Guillermo Lasso, there are excessive medical referrals to private hospitals; organizations consider that in some cases it is necessary

Excessive referrals to private hospitals is what, in the opinion of President Guillermo Lasso, exists in the public health system. He so he mentioned it in an interview that was broadcast on Sunday night.

“Let all those involved in the health system know that we have already realized that this act of corruption of excessive referrals to private hospitals exists,” he said.

Lasso makes surprise visits to health homes -according to him- to listen to the patients, the health personnel and then work with the Minister of Health, José Ruales, so that there is, for example, hiring more doctors for the Monte hospital Sinai, improve management and ensure the supply of medicines.

By way of example, the president maintained that at the Eugenio Espejo hospital in Quito, of the Ministry of Health, he spoke with the doctors, who would have told him that only 85% of its installed capacity is used.

“Here comes this little game of referring patients to private clinics and hospitals,” he said.

He referred to the Mount Sinai hospital, where the capacity of the laboratory of that health home and the imaging area, he added, is “immense”, and he has been told that it is being referred to private laboratories, for what he described as “acts of corruption ”.

Government debt with external health providers is around $350 million

It is not the first time that the Government refers to the issue.

In August 2022, Ruales -in an appearance in the Assembly- stated that they were working on a project to reduce referrals.

He explained that they have identified that more than 15% of referrals to hospitals are unnecessary, that they could be attended at the first level of care.

In addition, 70% of the referrals to the complementary private network were unnecessary, which were made due to lack of hospital management capacity due to the lack of a laboratory reagent, sterile clothing for surgery.

“All these elements have to be clearly identified and they have to be public, in such a way that we can intervene, that will allow us to reduce the debt with private providers, rationalize the capacities of hospitals so that they can provide care and reduce referrals. unnecessary to the private sector,” Ruales said on that occasion.

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Gustavo Dávila, from the Youth Against Cancer Foundation, justified certain referrals.

He argued that if the hospitals had the equipment working, the number of specialist professionals, the medicines, there would be no such need.

“The problem is that they do not have the equipment, or there are no specialists, or they do not have medicines, and in many cases instead of referring patients they do not even attend to them,” he considered.

Dávila added that previous governments have denounced the problem of referrals, which often also become “influence peddling or acts of corruption,” when some public hospitals without the need for referrals could be repowered with all their resources.

For Dávila, the solution is comprehensive and structural in the long term, adding that the shunts are a patch, but they are required, for example, for bone marrow transplants. (YO)