The Minister of Health already has chosen the new boss of the Algarve’s Central Hospital management team to replace Pedro Nunes.
Nunes’ long-awaited replacement should be in post later this month or early in March to the relief of much of the Algarve’s medical professionals who never took to Nunes’ somewhat autocratic management style.
The announcement of the new appointment will happen after the final approval is given by the Recruitment and Selection Committee for Public Administration, which has chosen one, but is waiting for the Health Minister, Adalberto Campos Fernandes, to make the announcement.
Other appointments are pretty certain with the position of Clinical Director to be filled by Carlos Santos, a Doctor at the Barlavento Hospital in Portimão, and the Director of Nursing is almost certain to be Nuno Murcho.
The changes should formally be announced when Adalberto Campos Fernandes comes to the Algarve to announce the creation of the Community of the Algarve Health Academy which will link the Algarve’s University to the region's health service.
The president of the Medical Association in the Algarve has insisted that a new management model must be put into place for the Algarve’s hospitals, but for the time being the old structure will have to do.
According to Ulisses Brito, the merger of the Faro, Portimão and Lagos hospitals in 2013 to form the Central Hospitals of the Algarve was poorly done by the current administration and that another management system is needed.
"The current model is bad, it should it be reversed in the interests of patients,” said Brito who added that the reorganisation of the hospital management system must be preceded by some deep reflection.
The Ministry of Health has yet to confirm the plan to dissolve the current management model and its replacement by two Local Health Units, but did say that “there is an ongoing study into the reorganisation of the National Health Service in the Algarve.”
Brito believes that the creation of the Central Hospitals of the Algarve management structure led to the disintegration of some hospital services and created constraints for health professionals who were forced to travel between hospitals, wasting time and increasing costs.
But the outgoing Dr Pedro Nunes claims that he did a great job and that there was no shortage of doctors, or if there was, that this immediately was remedied.
