Canarias has managed to carry out 1,600 more surgeries this year by extending surgical activity to evenings and weekends. This amounts to a total of 74,210 interventions of different types between January and June 2024, 2.5% more than in the first half of the previous year, when 72,525 surgeries were performed.
The activity of operating rooms outside normal working hours is one of the star measures of the Activa Plan, implemented at the end of last year by the Government of Canarias to address the enormous surgical demand in the archipelago. Notably, by the end of December 2023, 33,751 people were on the surgical waiting list (27% waiting more than six months) and about 147,952 awaited an appointment with their specialist, often a prerequisite for surgery. “I believe we have a good balance in terms of surgical activity,” said Monzón, who thanked the Director of the Canarian Health Service (SCS), Carlos Díaz, the present managers and workers for their efforts. “They have achieved important milestones and great achievements,” he said.
The Plan includes programmes to further intensify surgical, consultation, and testing activities, and envisages periodic evaluations of hospital activities. More specifically, it also proposes the completion of the prioritisation project for non-deferrable waiting list processes; the development of the Quality to the Wait project, to improve personalised care for patients on the waiting list; as well as improving information systems.
In recent months, several new operating rooms in Canarias have been opened, which have helped alleviate the saturation of those that were already in operation. Specifically, two day surgery operating rooms have been opened at the Northern Hospital and another two operating rooms at the Southern Hospital, both in Tenerife. The island has the highest number of patients on the surgical waiting list, with over half (51%) of all Canarians awaiting surgery.
Tenerife has over half of the patients waiting for surgery
These data were presented by the Health Minister, Esther Monzón, during a meeting of the Directorate Council of her department on Tuesday, which served to review the first year of management in the legislature. In addition to surgical activity, Monzón also mentioned the over half a million consultations attended in the first half of the year, which she also linked to the management plans implemented to increase hospital activity.
Staff growth
These improvements have been made possible, among other things, thanks to new hires, which have enabled the SCS staff to grow by 25.5%. That is, 7,055 more workers. Monzón also highlighted the importance of the ongoing stabilisation processes. As she pointed out, 113 categories are affected by this process to ensure that 12,428 professionals secure a permanent position within the Canarian healthcare system. Of these, 9,867 will obtain their position through an extraordinary merit competition initiated to compensate for the long period during which the Canarian healthcare system lacked public job offers. Additionally, as Monzón announced, the 2023 Public Employment Offer will stabilise about 20,000 more workers.
This is also due to the installation of new equipment (linear accelerators, neuroradiology equipment), more admission beds, new units for specific previously unattended pathologies (such as the Eating Disorder Unit in Gran Canaria), and even the opening of new buildings (such as the Multipurpose Building at La Candelaria Hospital) at SCS hospitals. Monzón specifically mentioned the new Maternal Tower – at the Maternal-Child Hospital of Gran Canaria – which will serve to expand the Emergency area. This new addition to the complex has begun its second phase this June.
However, hospital improvements are not the only initiatives implemented. With a 15.6% higher budget, Primary Care has also achieved new milestones in population care. This places Canarias among the top three regions increasing the budget for Primary Care while continuing to implement measures outlined in the +AP Strategy, with improvements in service portfolios, provision of technological equipment, infrastructure adjustments, and professional staffing.
In this regard, the Community Health Strategy in Primary Care 2024-2025 for health promotion and community participation initiatives has also been published with a total of 34 actions. Regarding chronic care – a key aspect of Primary Care – the AP_Cuida2 programme has been implemented in this semester with the aim of enhancing patient care continuity after hospital discharge, and an Action Plan for Complex Chronic Patient Care is currently under review by patient associations and scientific societies.
In the Public Health field, the Childhood Obesity Plan has been recently presented, and work has continued on the epidemiological surveillance system to analyse the status of respiratory diseases and their impact, as well as the entomological surveillance system, among other departmental activities.
Upcoming projects for the island’s healthcare
The strategic lines for the coming months were also discussed in the meeting. With the goal of placing the patient at the centre of the system, the Director General of Patient and Chronicity is working on developing a Humanisation Strategy for the SCS that transforms the care model towards a human-centred approach. The meeting also highlighted the start of the procurement process for the supply and installation of a positron emission radioisotope production unit (cyclotron), which increases diagnostic capacity in oncological, cardiological, and neurological diseases; and reiterated that the SCS will launch a Single Digital Medical Record.
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