Doctor in the ward for thirty-three hours: the carabinieri arrive

She began her shift in the San Marcellino Medicine at 12 noon on Friday, immediately informing the superiors that she would be alone and would not have the change. Thus, Dr. Maria Luisa Soddu, 59, continued to work for 33 hours, even after - at noon yesterday - the carabinieri showed up in the ward of her ward of the Muravera hospital, called to register the emergency. .

With various colleagues in sickness and a staff in the bone, the medical director originally from Alghero and in service in the small hospital of Sarrabus since 2008 was forced to remain on duty, always alone and uninterrupted, until late yesterday evening. At 9 pm in the hospital the changes were made between surgery and the emergency room and the substitute arrived in medicine.

The warning

"I had already reported that the situation was critical for some time", clarifies the lawyer Giacomo Doglio, lawyer of the doctor, "I had sent a warning on November 22 because at San Marcellino there were medical managers who were also doing 50 hours of weekly work, including two with permits to assist disabled family members (law 104) who could therefore not even ask for permits. We also denounced the serious psychophysical situation in which they are forced to work ».

In the hospital in Viale Rinascita the situation has been difficult for days: of the five doctors on duty in the Medicine Department, all women, at the moment four would be ill. In recent days, from Cagliari, the leaders of the ASL apparently had decided to order two doctors in Muravera, complete with a service order already notified, but they too would have entered into illness. Result? Until last night, Dr. Soddu did not have a shift change, forced to stay in the ward so as not to leave the ward uncovered.

The arrival of the carabinieri

At noon yesterday the carabinieri of the mobile radio unit of the Compagnia di San Vito arrived, called precisely because the woman could not leave the hospital well beyond the end of her shift. The military scored everything, but at the moment no communication would have been forwarded to the prosecutor on duty, the deputy prosecutor Rossella Spano. It is not excluded that a report may be sent to the Prosecutor's Office in the next few days, but it is more likely that the affair will have a judicial aftermath in a civil forum. "From 12 noon on Friday one of the medical managers is at work continuously for 32 hours", the lawyer Doglio clarified around 20 yesterday, "the situation is unsustainable".

The emergency

To underline the difficulties is also the mayor of Muravera, Salvatore Piu, who was a doctor on duty for forty years, the last as head physician at the Marino hospital in Cagliari. "There are problems in covering shifts in much larger hospitals than ours", he stressed, "I hoped that the big hospitals would go to the rescue of the little ones, but the opposite is happening: the little ones have gone to the aid of the big ones. And now the shortage of doctors and nurses is becoming heavy ».

The solution

Around 8 pm yesterday a solution was still being sought to stop the emergency. To work on it the directorates of the emergency room and surgery. The hypothesis in the field? That a surgeon was going to fill the post in the emergency-urgency ward, while one of the doctors in the emergency room should have made himself available to allow Dr. Maria Luisa Soddu to return home. Only after 33 consecutive hours of work the manager was able to pass the deliveries to the substitute.

To weigh there would be the positivity to Covid of some doctors, therefore forced to remain in quarantine, in addition to the now reduced staff. The intervention of the carabinieri yesterday thus caused a situation to explode that had already been reported for days, but which could repeat itself if we do not take cover.

Francesco Pinna