At the end of October 2020, the regional Ministry of Health announced that 383 medical workers had resigned since the start of the pandemic in the Saratov region: 203 doctors and 180 nurses. Recently, the department announced a new figure: since the “deployment of coronavirus beds”, 442 medical workers (137 doctors and 212 paramedics) have left their work.
But this is not scary, the first Deputy Minister of Health of the Saratov Region Stanislav Shuvalov reassured the public: as many as 776 people replaced the departed doctors in the same period! True, 185 of them are university students, and 13 are college graduates. And how long they will last in public health is a big question.
The picture presented by the Ministry of Health is extremely blissful. According to them, doctors and nurses are just arriving, but then why are there so many vacancies in regional hospitals? If you believe the bank of vacancies in medical organizations in the region, posted on the website of the regional ministry of health, almost every second medical institution in the region invites doctors or nurses to work. However, the situation in Saratov hospitals is rather calm. Take, for example, the Regional Clinical Hospital, located in the Smirnovsky Gorge (vacancies are valid for January 2021). The medical facility requires one neurosurgeon, urologist, thoracic surgeon, oncologist, as well as three neurologists and four “scarce” anesthesiologists – resuscitators.
But in large regional hospitals, the staffing situation is very deplorable.
At the beginning of January 2021, Balakovo city hospital required 4 obstetricians – gynecologists, 4 neurologists, 4 doctors of clinical laboratory diagnostics, 5 doctors – infectious disease specialists, 4 cardiologists, 4 pediatricians, 8 doctors – general practitioners, 4 surgeons, 2 urologists and 59 (!) ward nurses with a salary of 17 thousand rubles. The institution offers doctors from 30 to 35 thousand rubles a month.
It is still sadder in the Balashovsky district hospital. It requires 10 district therapists, 7 surgeons, 8 cardiologists, 5 neurologists, 3 ultrasound doctors, 7 doctors – radiologists, 2 endocrinologists, 4 anesthesiologists – resuscitators (all doctors have the specified salary – 58 thousand 179 rubles). But, in addition to this, the Balashov hospital is looking for two infectious disease doctors in the infectious diseases department for patients with coronavirus infection COVID-19, with a salary of 170 thousand rubles a month, and two nurses there, with an income of 95 thousand rubles. If Saratov doctors do not go to work in large districts of the region even with these salaries, it is likely that the region’s health care system is in danger of complete collapse. And, very soon.