The secretary general of the Romanian College of Doctors (CMR), Hindrovel Dumitra, said on Thursday that there was a “misunderstanding” at government level when a family doctor’s income was estimated at €15,000 a month, explaining that it could have been about those working in rural areas and has many patients, or about those who have more employees, reports Agerpres.

“The best thing (…) I realized is that family doctors, outpatients and patients have common interests, and when external threats appear, we can react as much as possible so that certain mistakes that happen in the Po government in fact, we witnessed a media campaign, one in which we voiced our grievances, and another in which a lot of information came out from the government. And because we don’t want everything to remain somehow different, unclear, we have to say that there was a misunderstanding with those 15,000 euros per capita,” said Hindrovel Dumitra at a press conference.

He emphasized that due to the gradual reduction of doctors, with more than 2,200 patients registered, rural areas would be at a disadvantage.

“Indeed, there are offices that can have a little more income, but we are talking, in particular, about offices located in rural areas, where, like it or not, the Romanian Parliament has decided that a doctor, from a nearby settlement, can create a workplace , precisely to provide medical services to patients in this area. However, this is also the reason why I insisted today that the progressive depunctuation should not be done at this moment, because it is these areas that will be affected,” the CMR general secretary added.

According to him, CMR supports doctors who invest in the material sphere and in personnel.

“I saw colleagues in despair during this period. There are colleagues who employ three, four, five, or even six nurses, who, even if they had a fairly high invoice value, also had rather large expenses. (…) We support colleagues who invest not only in the material sphere, (…) but also in personnel. I (…) hired a new nurse who deals with prevention. To go back now and cut the budget is to fire that person. it’s not normal. That’s why I said that mistakes were made at the level of the Government when these resources were distributed poorly,” Dumitra said.

The president of the Romanian College of Doctors (CMR), Daniel Coriu, announced on Thursday that after discussions with the CNAS, tariffs for medical services provided by family and outpatient doctors will remain unchanged until June 30, 2024, at the level from the last quarter of 2023.

Prime Minister Marcel Cholaku said a few days ago that the cost of medical services paid by family doctors is a matter of discussion, and he called for a balance between the earnings of a doctor practicing in the city and a doctor from the countryside. He estimated that a monthly income of 15,000 euros for a doctor is “a bit high”.

“Do you think it’s fair to have a cap on GP incomes? I asked for all the stats. There are family doctors who earn per capita, not necessarily on medical services, more than 10,000-15,000 euros. The amounts seem a bit overestimated to me, so a negotiation is underway, we sit down at the table and balance. If we still want it, we have to put this country in order, we have to get rid of the exceptions, we have to create a middle ground. You can’t have doctors in big developed cities earning more than 15,000 euros and a doctor in a rural area with more people, older people and more work, more travel to earn a very high small amount We have to find a balance, there has to be social justice”, – emphasized Cholaku.

How much would the amounts paid to polyclinics decrease, according to the original CNAS proposal, which caused protests from family and outpatient doctors:

At family doctors:

• The cost of a point per capita decreases from 12 lei in 2023 to 7.7 lei in 2024
• The cost of points for a medical service will decrease from 8 lei in 2023 to 6.2 lei in 2024

Outpatient (polyclinic) specialist doctors:

• The cost of points for a medical service will decrease from 4.5 lei in 2023 to 3.3 lei in 2024
• Outpatient doctors do not receive money per capita
• Tariffs for family medicine and outpatient clinics increased to current values ​​on July 1, 2023.

On the same topic:

• Family doctors and outpatient clinics can abandon protests: CNAS will not reduce office rates in the first half of 2024