Radio România Internațional

Tag: vacancy-filling contests

  • Romania gripped by shortage of physicians

    Romania gripped by shortage of physicians

    Romania faces a shortage of thousands of physicians, medical residents and nurses, the Health Ministry says. Over 8,600 vacancies are reported in state hospitals for physicians alone. Large cities, including Bucharest, are equally struggling, although the most severe shortages are reported in rural areas – over 300 villages lack a family physician, while over half of settlements don’t have enough healthcare professionals. In certain villages, shortages were partly solved by bringing in physicians from retirement or by setting up auxiliary care units employing medical professionals tenured elsewhere. As regards medical residents, Health Ministry data points to some 1,600 vacancies. The biggest deficit is reported in the nursing sector, with over 14,500 vacancies at national level, regardless of training. Most of these are reported in hospitals, while the rest in emergency services and wards.

     

     

    How did it come to this, considering salaries in the health sector have increased significantly, by some 80% starting 2018? Despite the pay rise, physicians continue to leave the country seeking more appealing work conditions. In 2023, over 800 physicians applied for the Healthcare Professional Certificate in order to seek employment abroad. In the last year, medical staff shortages have worsened. In May 2023, the Government froze vacancy-filling contests to cut public spending, requiring each specific sector to submit memoranda for all new hires. Following certain protest actions, the Government early this year decided to open to public contest 7,600 vacancies in the health and social welfare sector. However, the procedure typically takes two months, from the moment the announcement is made public to the start of the employment contract.

     

     

    Due to the shortage of physicians and nurses, current employees are overworked, while patients often don’t get the proper care they deserve, hospital managers say. The phenomenon is all the more worrisome as employees are often recalled from paid leave to ensure regular shifts. A Romanian Court of Auditors report examining the human resources management and health infrastructure development over 2014-2021 shows that Romania ranks second to last at EU level in terms of physicians employed nationwide, with a little over 300 physicians per 100 thousand inhabitants. (VP)

  • The government has unlocked vacancy-filling contests in the healthcare syst

    The government has unlocked vacancy-filling contests in the healthcare syst

    Employment in the medical system was unlocked by the Romanian Government, following several requests in this sense. One of the requests came from the College of Physicians in Bucharest, which called on the Finance Ministry to approve the memorandum submitted by the Health Ministry for the hospitals under its authority, as well as the one submitted by the Development Ministry for the units subordinated to the local authorities. The College, which pointed out that difficult situations are encountered during this period, especially in the Emergency Rooms, due to the insufficient number of doctors, recalled that employment in the public system, including in the public healthcare system, was frozen in the middle of last year. The college drew attention that the lack of staff in hospitals means the exhaustion of the existing one, who have to often work overtime, which can lead, in addition to physical fatigue, to diminishing the quality of the medical services provided to patients or to delays in providing medical assistance.



    Thus, in the context of intense pressure from the healthcare system, the government decided to organize contests to fill more than 7,600 vacancies in medical units with staff shortages. 2,500 of the posts are for doctors. The healthcare units that requested the organization of vacancy-filling contests need to immediately start the necessary procedures. The social-democratic Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu underlined that the budget of the Health Ministry is 40% higher than last year, highlighting that each vacancy filled must be reflected in better services for patients. He stated that 6.6 billion lei (about 1.3 billion euros) have already been allocated, which paid off last year’s debts from the healthcare system and ensured the current expenses for this month for medicines and medical services.



    In turn, the Health Minister, Alexandru Rafila, pointed out that all doctors posts that were requested by health units were approved, regardless of whether they are subordinated to the Health Ministry or the local authorities. Moreover, within the Memorandum proposed by the Health Ministry, over 365 posts of those approved for vacancy-filling contests are within the ambulance services, given the importance of emergency medicine and the interventions that must be carried out during this period to various calls. Alexandru Rafila asked the healthcare units not to wait too long and to immediately initiate the legal procedures for organizing vacancy-filling contests. He added that, after publication, the contests can be organized within 30 days. The Hleath Minister also said that, at the level of the Government, the discussions will continue and, depending on the needs, other memoranda of approval may be initiated during this year. (LS)

  • Solutions for the health system

    Solutions for the health system

    This is not the first time Romanian lawmakers have to amend their own freshly adopted decisions. At the end of 2023, the ruling coalition announced a hiring freeze in the public sector in 2024. Today, they discovered the medical system faces a chronic shortage of workers, and thus announced the unblocking of thousands of vacancies. While years ago Romanian physicians had salaries similar to elsewhere in Western Europe, today many doctors continue to search for better paid jobs abroad, leaving an increasing number of villages without doctors and municipal hospitals without specialists. Looking at the statistics, healthcare professionals say only Bucharest and other large university centers such as Cluj-Napoca, Târgu Mureș, Iași or Craiova have enough physicians, while nearly three quarters of counties face a severe shortage.




    From the opposition, USR claims there is a nationwide deficit of over 20,000 nurses and auxiliary staff and some 8,000 physicians. 15,000 doctors are needed at national level, Oana Sivache, executive director of the Administration of Hospitals and Medical Services in Bucharest says, arguing that the governments measures to cut public spending have led to personnel losses, creating difficulties for patients. “We call on the Health Ministry to recognize the critical situation regarding the shortage of medical staff and come up with a methodology for filling vacancies over ta definite period of one year, similar to the measures adopted during the pandemic”.




    Oana Sivache criticizes the governments decisions, saying they were adopted in the absence of a preliminary analysis that should factor in the hard realities in the system. In response to such criticism, Health Minister Alexandru Rafila expressed hope the Finance Ministry would adopt over the course of this week the memos for the filling of vacancies in hospitals under the Health Ministrys administration, as well as in those managed by local authorities. Minister Rafila told Radio Romania a few thousand jobs will be made available, first and foremost addressing physicians, including those who took the specialty exam at the end of last year, as well as nurses and auxiliary staff. In turn, Finance Minister Marcel Boloș, who needs to green-light this move and disburse the necessary funds, estimates the problem will be settled this week. The final decision rests with Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu. (VP)


  • January 5, 2024

    January 5, 2024

    CONTESTS
    – Romanian Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu has promised to solve the problem of
    resident doctors who took the specialty exam last year as quickly as possible.
    In the first government session of 2024, the Prime Minister said he doesn’t
    want these physicians to leave searching for jobs abroad, and called on the
    relevant authorities to take action so as to hold vacancy-filling contests.
    Both USR in opposition and the Administration of Hospitals and Medical Services
    in Bucharest complained about medical personnel shortage, accusing the ruling
    coalition of having brought the medical system to the brink of imminent
    collapse by ignoring the crisis in the medical system or by operating draconic
    cuts to hospital budgets, thus endangering patients’ lives.




    INFLATION
    – The National Bank of Romania expects an annual inflation rate of over 6% for
    December, Central Bank spokesman Dan Suciu told Radio Romania. The inflation
    rate showed signs of slowing down in November, when it dropped from 8% the
    previous month to 6.7%. Dan Suciu believes early 2024 will determine an
    increase in the inflation rate as the new fiscal measures took effect starting
    January 1, but says it will go down at the end of the first quarter. External
    factors greatly impact prices, for instance tensions in the Middle East affect
    fuel prices, Dan Suciu also argues.




    AGREEMENT
    – Bulgaria, Romania and Turkey are expected to sign a joint agreement for
    demining operations in the Black Sea. Bulgaria’s Defense Minister Todor Tagarev
    said the agreement has long been in the making, and the parties have finally
    agreed on the final details. The agreement will be signed next week and
    provides for the creation of a trilateral demining task force in the Black Sea.
    Since the launch of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, a lot of maritime mines
    have exploded in the Black Sea, the latest such incident involving a Greek
    vessel in December.




    ROMANIA -
    UKRAINE – Representatives of Romania and Ukraine have signed an agreement
    for developing relations in the field of digitization and cyber-security, the
    Ministry of Research, Innovation and Digitization reports. The agreement will
    serve as the foundation for a new mechanism whereby the European Union will
    fund technology and know-how transfer projects in Ukraine under Romania’s
    coordination. The goals are to increase resilience and protect digital
    infrastructure in Ukraine and Romania, to consolidate the level of
    cyber-security for the infrastructure grids of Ukraine and Romania, to develop
    cloud infrastructures for electronic public services and to exchange know-how
    in terms of developing policies in the field of electronic communications and
    emerging technologies.




    JAPAN EARTHQUAKE – Rescue teams are
    still searching for the 242 people that went missing in the wake on the New
    Year’s devastating earthquake in Japan. The critical period of 72 hours for
    finding survivors ended yesterday. The number of casualties of the 7.6
    Richter-scale quake in the Noto peninsula went up to 92. Japan has doubled the
    number of military troops taking part in search and rescue operations to 4,600.




    HANDBALL
    – The Romanian men’s team is today playing Argentina on the second day of
    Yellow Cup, hosted by Winterthur. Yesterday, Romania lost 37-31 to Switzerland.
    Yellow Cup is the final test ahead of the EHF EURO 2024, where Romania will
    play in Group B alongside Spain, Austria and Croatia. Spain was vice-champion
    in 2022, Austria defeated Romania in both preliminary fixtures while Croatia
    played the final in 2020. The top two teams in each group will advance to the
    main group phase. Romania had last qualified to a European Championship in
    1996. (VP)