Such is the staffing chaos within the Algarve’s National Health Service, doctors are flying down from the north on Friday evenings, to work 24 or 48 hours in the Algarves’ maternity wards.
Attracted by pay of €50 per hour, pediatricians and obstetricians from other regions of the country have been covering for gaps in local staffing.
Doctors are taking advantage of low cost flights between Porto and Faro, to earn some weekend shift-work money in the maternity services run by the University Hospital of Algarve.
Specialists can earn €2,400 per weekend and the Algarve’s overburdened health service must pay the cost as hospitals must have obstetricians and pediatricians on duty.
The hospital management says “it is the law of supply and demand. The amounts we pay doctors are variable. In the rarer specialisations, where there is a greater shortage of doctors, the fees will be higher," according to Ana Paula Gonçalves, chairman of the Algarve health service's board.
The staffing situation at the Algarve’s maternity wards has been raised by Algarve MP, Christovão Norte, after it was made public that a baby had to be resuscitated by an anaesthetist after a birth because there was no service pediatrician.
