At 2 am on October 1, officials of the Audit Office were in the Accident and Emergency Departments of the general hospitals of Nicosia and Limassol, carrying out simultaneous unannounced inspections in the context of the decision of the Auditor General for on-site visits to all essential services.
The checks focused on whether the medical staff who should have been on duty were actually present, as well as whether the staff on call responded to the A&E calls within the prescribed time limits.
In response to a relevant question by "F", the Audit Office confirmed the fact, but did not provide more information regarding the results. It was reported that the audit was completed at 2:00 a.m., the staff of the A&E responded positively and the findings will be presented in a special report in the near future.
As pointed out, this action, i.e. unannounced inspections, inaugurates a new practice of unannounced inspections, without warning, at any time of the day or night, even on holidays, focusing on critical government services.
This decision had been announced a few hours earlier by the Auditor General, Andreas Papaconstantinou, in an interview with LegalMatters, hosted by Christoforos Christofis.
Andreas Papakonstantinou, in their relevant statement, stated that "what is required is to record the real picture of the functioning of the state, as, as he mentioned, it is imperative to reflect the experience of the citizen when requesting services from the public administration, regardless of the time".
The new philosophy, said the Auditor General, "includes both unannounced audits and 'citizen experience' audits, in order to evaluate in practice the quality of the services provided".
It is noted that the presence and readiness of medical staff in the A&E is a perennial topic of discussion, as it directly affects the speed of response to emergencies and, by extension, the safety of patients.
Finally, it is recalled that a special allowance is paid for these duties, a fact that in the past has been the subject of controversy between OKYPY and the trade unions, while it has been pointed out in several reports of the Audit Office and has been extensively discussed both publicly and in Parliament with the parties involved expressing their views.
