Jose Polo Garcia and Pilar Rodriguez Ledo.
the summons MIR 2023 will have 119 more seats for the medical specialty Family medicine, however, this 5 percent increase from the last call does not solve the shortage of professionals that lives, and will go to more, the first level of care. The doctors have welcomed this increase in places, but it is a suppressed emotion because they predict that there will be deserted places once more if jointly improve working conditions in Primary Care.
It should be remembered that since the 2014-2015 call, the greatest increase in absolute numbers corresponds to Family Medicine. This medical specialty, the most affected in the last MIR call following having closed the process with 93 vacancies, has added 801 more positions in the last eight years.
“The number of vacant places can increase because supply grows, but not demand. The percentage of abandonment can be double. We hope that it does not happen because then there will not be enough generational change,” laments José Polo García, president of the Spanish Society of Primary Care Physicians (Semergen).
Some deserted places that, according to the vice president of the Spanish Society of General and Family Physicians (SEMG), Pilar Rodríguez Ledo, “they will be there” as long as working conditions do not change: “Some isolated measure may have punctual benefits one year, but they are ethereal benefits. A global improvement must be made because, furthermore, right now any isolated measure is not credible.”
A comprehensive approach to avoid empty places
Beyond the possible desert of vacancies if measures are not taken, the doctors describe the increase in supply as essential. “It is vacancies need to be increased because you need a higher number of residentsbut it is also necessary to do a comprehensive approach so that the places that increase are covered. For this it is important a fair election that ensures it and a improvement of conditions in the performance of the activity so that people want to do Family Medicine”, explains Ledo.
An assessment shared by the president of Semergen: “Already last year there was an increase and this is positive, however, the problem is that they were discovered and we have to analyze the causes and find out how to incentivize coverage. We have been repeating for years that one of the pending issues is to improve the conditions of Primary Care and that the doctor knows during his undergraduate training the first level of care. If there are already empty places this year, no matter how much we increase more, they will not be filled the next”.
Lower the cutoff note and not make any more patches
For Ledo, the problem is so long-standing and in such a limit situation that he even warns that without a complete approach, health centers will function less and less. “We run the risk that places will be deserted once more and if initially this is not the case, throughout the year they are renounced. If people join without being very convinced and see a work environment that they do not want to have throughout their lives, they end up giving up the job. The solution is to do a integral approach of all Primary. This doesn’t support any more patches.” the doctor points out.
For his part, the president of Semergen considers that, in addition to addressing an improvement in working conditions, several processes must be improved in the MIR election. “One of the solutions is do not impose a minimum mark, since the MIR is a system with a cutoff mark and it can be lowered so that people are not left out. It is not regarding giving seats with a suspense. can be lowered and do not offer vacant places to non-EU citizens that following the training period they leave”, claims Polo.
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