“The Italian Federation of General Practitioners (FIMMG) Molise, – reads a note by President Antonio Tartaglione – denounces the unsustainable situation that has arisen following the increase in infections and the related bureaucratic procedures and related certifications, too often improper and unnecessary.
Family doctors (GPs), in collaboration with the Continuity of Care and the Special Units of Continuity of Care, are working beyond all limits to deal with the health emergency in the area.
In addition to all the usual pathologies, family doctors are following the cases of COVID, close contacts, indirect contacts by telephone. This extraordinary effort cannot bear the weight of incongruous, useless requests, which cause waste of time and useless discussions.
An example for everyone: these days there is a comings and goings of school staff and students in our studies holding the report of the swabs carried out asking us to certify that on day xx they carried out the swab with negative results. It is not clear why the copy of the report issued by ASREM is not sufficient.
FIMMG Molise therefore reaffirms that general practitioners (GPs) have no power to “free” citizens in quarantine or in isolation for provisions of public hygiene, nor to issue disease certificates to asymptomatic contacts without hygiene measures o issue certificates for returning to work to persons in quarantine or to those who have finished the same but do not have the end of quarantine certificate issued by public health.
And they do not have the right to make sickness certificates for subjects waiting to swab and receive the relative report.
Likewise, the general practitioner cannot take the place of public hygiene, in understandable difficulty due to the overwhelming numbers, asking for swabs from all asymptomatic contacts of patients with positive results.
Often, the requests made by the GPs, under the pressing insistence of the patients, are then added to the requests prepared by the Hygiene Office at the conclusion of the epidemiological investigation, generating further confusion.
While understanding the concerns of citizens, the requests to know why, after 8-10 days from our request to carry out the swab, they have not yet been summoned, cannot be granted by the GPs.
Just as the repeated requests to know in advance the results of the swabs, addressed to family doctors, are equally useless as the general practitioner has no way of anticipating the results of the swabs compared to the data published on regional sites or on the electronic health record. , which can be consulted directly by citizens.
All this takes away time and energy, in the midst of the largest vaccination campaign ever carried out and which sees, more than ever, general practitioners directly involved.
This unbearable pressure is undermining the ability of general medicine to properly treat the chronically ill, the most fragile subjects in home care, and those suffering from acute diseases, including seasonal ones that are typical and frequent in this period.
If he skips general medicine, there will be no more filters and hospitals will be stormed with disastrous consequences. It takes a sense of responsibility and collaboration on the part of all to resist and win this terrible battle.
It is necessary to clarify the rules for the management of tampons, for the determination of the quarantine periods, to intervene on the “authorizing officers of useless certificates (employers and schools), and it is necessary to give widespread information to all citizens.”
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