On World Emergency Day help - May 27, the situation with the emergency teams in our country is increasingly tragic. The system permanently lacks 500 doctors, although the salary of a doctor in an ambulance reached BGN 4,000, BNR reported. More than half of the seats remain unoccupied. This is written by the Union of Paramedics in Bulgaria.
In most EU countries, an analysis has long been made that medical work in ambulances is extremely expensive, and that is why single medical teams are left there, which take on only strictly specialized cases. In all other situations, the emergency is provided by paramedics.
The paramedic cannot replace the doctor, but his special training allows for stabilization, maintenance of vital signs and emergency transport to the nearest medical facility, where the victim is taken over by a trained medical team. It has been proven that in countries where paramedics are implemented in the Emergency Service system, the death rate in accidents has decreased by more than 70%.
In our country, there is no will for reform that would allow paramedics to be legally assigned to emergency centers. All of this is measured in lives lost as the lack of crews slows down service to addresses and emergency transport. On a massive scale and in many regions of the country, it is completely impossible to observe the "golden hour" in severe emergencies and accidents.
The Union of Paramedics in Bulgaria has been working on this case for a whole year now, but despite dozens of meetings, participation in committees and working groups, the steps forward are very slow. Paramedics continue to be employed in emergency centers in other positions without precisely regulating their duties. Others despair and choose emigration as the only possibility of realization in the profession. Still others start working in medical facilities or use their skills to provide sports competitions, film productions, children's camps.
The Union of Paramedics analyzed the vacancies announced by the 27 emergency centers in the country. They are looking for at least 10 doctors in each of the CSMPs. Calls such as “urgently hiring“ and yet there are no appointments. There are also vacancies for nurses and paramedics. Transforming them into paramedic positions would help the system and patients tremendously. According to a response to our letter from the Ministry of Health, this is within the authority of each director of the CSMP and cannot be centrally ordered by the ministry. Although some of the CSMP have included in their development plans the appointment of paramedics, this is difficult to do.
There is a positive practice in CSMP – Sofia, Plovdiv and Burgas, but in other areas of the country – no, although somewhere the vacancies reach 60%. In the Vratsa region, for example, they are looking for 10 doctors. The situation is similar in Silistra.
Another problem is that despite the existence of uniform protocols for working in emergency care, in each of the areas they work according to different rules. There is no mandatory one-year emergency training for all employees – doctors, nurses and other staff.
Without such training, it is impossible to work in Emergency Services in the European Union, and here, due to a lack of staff, doctors are appointed who have nothing to do with providing emergency medical care, and the quality suffers from that. Therefore, on today's emergency aid day, we should not only express appreciation and gratitude to those employed in the system, but also acknowledge mistakes, take stock and chart a way forward, because tomorrow an ambulance may be waiting for each of us.