Once the coronavirus pandemic caused the temporary closure of the outpatient clinic of hospitals to turn their attention to the people who were infected, the Ecuadorian Institute of Social Security (IESS) prepares a plan to cover the dammed appointments, especially , in the province of Pichincha.
In this part of the national territory, there was a greater reduction in medical appointments in the internal and external health network of the IESS last year.
According to the entity’s figures, there were more than a million appointments, 21% less than in 2019. From 5.7 million visits it fell to 3.8 million.
In January, on the social network Twitter, Marco Mazza published that his mother needed an appointment for having 55% hearing loss in the right ear and 77% in the left.
He said they had been waiting four months for an answer for an otolaryngology appointment at the IESS.
Like Mazza’s mother, there are other patients on the waiting list for their appointments to be rescheduled in Quito.
Edwin Gavilánez, president of the Ariel Chicho Gavilánez Foundation for Life, said that the problem is that hospitals in the capital are full of patients infected with coronavirus.
Julio López Marín, director of the General Health Insurance of the IESS, pointed out that the dam is greater in Pichincha because Social Security allocated more beds (from three centers) than in other provinces to care for patients who were infected with the coronavirus.
He commented that, for example, the Quito Sur hospital, cataloged as a sentinel to deal with Covid-19 cases, even occupied the cafeteria space to receive the sick.
Marco Bonifaz, deputy director of Medical Audit of that health home, indicated that, in that place, the consultations decreased by 70%, because the specialists focused on the care of the infected. However, he said that there is a call center that is staffed by doctors to assist users.
Something similar would happen in the Carlos Andrade Marín hospital (HCAM), which also has a call center to give shifts and through telemedicine attends to the affiliates.
Last February, the IESS call center had 2.296 requests for medical consultations in Pichincha that were not assigned due to lack of availability. This is 34% of the total unsatisfied demand (6.726).
López said that the information is raised to evacuate the dammed consultations and for this he said that the Pichincha Plan be prepared, which consists of establishing alliances with medical units in the province.
The official said that more than 14.000 surgeries were suspended in the country in addition to the consultations, of which 9.000 remain to be attended and are scheduled to be performed until the middle of this year. The HCAM has at least 360 dammed operations.
A report from Social Security reveals that the appointments for external consultation nationwide in 2019 were 19’597.499; while in 2020 they were 16’653.521. Only in Pichincha in 2019 there were 4’898.188 appointments and in 2020, 3’862.526.
In 22 of the 24 provinces there was a decrease in care of between 3% and 27.5%, the highest percentage was reported in Galapagos. There, of the 39,249 appointments registered in 2019 it dropped to 28,430, in 2020.
Manabí had 466.104 fewer queries last year compared to 2019; Guayas, 404.507; Loja, 132.515; Los Ríos, 131.254, among others.
In the cases of Santa Elena and Orellana, they are the only provinces in the country that registered an increase in medical care for IESS members and retirees in the outpatient areas of Social Security centers and external health providers during 2020.
In the case of the peninsula, there was an increase of less than 1% (from 438.920 visits, it rose to 440.541). While the Amazon province rose 10% (from 45.903 to 50.510).
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