Filenews 26 June 2024 - by Marilena Panayi
State hospitals are on strike. The State Health Services Organization, in a letter sent yesterday to doctors, informs the unions that it accepts to grant an additional amount of €800,000 (from €3.1 million that was the initial proposal to €4.1 million) for the vertical incentives of the last four months of 2023.
At the same time, however, it rejects the proposals of the two unions to include income from afternoon work (which doctors are paid for under a separate agreement) but also income from clinical laboratories, TAEP and mental health services.
It is recalled that the agreement currently in force provides that the SHSO pays, at a percentage, financial incentives (in addition to the monthly salary and other allowances) to specialist doctors, depending on the productivity of each clinic, on the basis of a defined financial target, which results from the amount of compensation received from the Health Insurance Organization.
Until September 2023, the SHSO was compensated by the HIO on the basis of a specific unit price. Depending on the unit that applied until then, the amount of financial incentives of doctors was calculated. With the change in the way the HIO reimburses GHS hospitals, the unit price at which the SHSO is reimbursed has been reduced, therefore, the Organization has also adjusted the amount of financial incentives that doctors will receive for the period September – December 2023.
The PASYDY and PASYKI trade unions did not accept this reduction in the financial incentives that doctors will be paid for the last four months of last year (from the day of the change in the unit price in which the SHSO is compensated by the HIO) and this disagreement now leads to a 48-hour strike for next week and specifically for July 2 and 3.
In its letter to the two trade unions, the SHSO stated verbatim:
- "Taking into account the fact that in the last four months of the year 2023 there was a differentiation in the unit price for inpatient healthcare, it approves the revision of the vertical downward incentive target in proportion to the unit price reduction.
- In addition to the €15.2 million horizontal incentive tip. which has already been paid, approves the payment of the vertical incentive tip, which amounts to €4.1 million. the final allocation of which to the clinics/departments of the Organization will be decided after discussion and agreement with the trade unions.
- It does not approve of the inclusion of the afternoon work program in the revenue on the grounds that the work mentioned is compensated by a separate agreement where there is a clear provision that it will be excluded from the incentive scheme.
- It does not approve the inclusion of revenues from hospital laboratories, emergency departments and mental health services as they are excluded from the existing agreement."
As the SHSO further points out: "According to the labour market regime, the remuneration of doctors working in public hospitals is very good and compares favourably with the remuneration of the private sector and other countries of the European Union."
This paragraph annoyed the guilds, which described its content as ''offensive''.
