The Independent Technical Commission (CTI) for the refoundation of INEM proposes the creation of a single service center bringing together CODU and SNS24, and the opening of non-emergent patient transport to the private sector, reveals this Saturday, December 6, the newspaper Public.
The proposal to refound the National Institute of Medical Emergency (INEM), already submitted to the Ministry of Health, argues that distress calls made to 112 and the SNS24 Health Line (808242424) are answered at the same call center.
Speaking to Público, the president of the CTI, Leonor Furtado, explained that the creation of this unique center aims to obtain “gains in efficiency and safety”, because the response “becomes faster and more immediate”, even due to the physical proximity of the different human resources responsible for medical assistance.
There may even be more than one number, but the exchange is together, which will make it “easier to activate and distribute means, instead of having to transfer the call to another line”, said Leonor Furtado.
The single line must have three regional centers, in Lisbon, Porto and Coimbra, which must work with customer service technicians, who must be given specific theoretical and practical training of between 150 and 200 hours and who will carry out the initial screening of calls and activate the means.
This center must be coordinated by a doctor “with autonomy in deciding the final destination and referencing resources”, for which he has the support of internists or specialists in urgency and emergency and nurses capable of guaranteeing patient counseling, support in clinical triage and in the decision to activate resources and who will transmit clinical data to the destination hospitals.
According to Público, the creation of the “single service line” will take up to three years to implement.
With common medical coordination, coordination with SNS24 will, for example, make it possible to quickly schedule an appointment, says the newspaper, highlighting that one of the conclusions reached by the CTI is that “around 40% of calls waiting for CODU and around 6% of answered calls are transferred to the SNS24 Line”.
The proposed changes also provide that the most differentiated means “must be allocated” to local health units (ULS), “with sharing of resources and career advantages”, in addition to opening non-emergency patient transport to private operators, which is currently provided by firefighters and the Red Cross.
The analysis carried out by the commission confirmed the serious problems identified by audits by the General Inspectorate of Finance and the General Inspectorate of Health Activities.
INEM has “deficiencies in command, control and auditing”, the IT systems “are functionally obsolete”, there are insufficiencies in training and “great asymmetry in response and activation times” of resources and their distribution across the country, he highlights.
For CTI, the large share of the budget – “more than 50%” – affects the main partners of the integrated medical emergency system (SIEM) — fire brigades and the Portuguese Red Cross, although with different distribution — “harms the search for partners and alternative models for the provision of pre-hospital medical emergency service”.
Furthermore, the “management systems – strategic, operational and resources – and internal control do not guarantee the good management of money and other public assets”.