„The Constitutional Court must clarify whether it is possible to single out one professional group from others in this way,“ said a member of the Seimas Health Affairs Committee to BNS.
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According to her, there is also a shortage of other specialists in the regions, such as teachers, engineers.
The politician hoped that her appeal would be supported by faction colleagues, opposition liberals. J. Sejonienė intends to submit it to the court in the autumn.
As BNS wrote, the Seimas adopted the amendments in mid-June, and they were signed by President Gitanas Nausėda at the end of the month.
The amendments provide that in addition to the planned state-funded residency places, additional places will appear where students will commit to working for five years in a healthcare institution located in a certain county facing a shortage of medical staff.
The list of healthcare institutions entitled to sign contracts, taking into account the shortage of certain doctors in respective parts of the country, will be approved by the Minister of Health.
Earlier, acting Minister of Health Marija Jakubauskienė said that from last year until 2027, the number of such additional medical residency study places will increase by 20 places annually, with a total of 60 planned over three years.
These changes are also criticized by part of the medical community.
As BNS said, the head of the Young Doctors Association Laurynas Maciulevičius stated that before adopting the amendments, the reasons why doctors are lacking in the regions were not clarified.
„If we do not know the reasons, it is also unclear how to solve this problem,“ said the doctor.
He also missed an impact assessment of the amendments.
„It remains unanswered what impact this particular adopted draft law could have on the entire system, the economy, and perhaps even emigration. Now everything is presented as if the number of doctors will increase. But whether this will really happen is a question,“ said the head of the Young Doctors Association.
According to L. Maciulevičius, doctors should spend about a third of their residency time in the regions, but the reality is different. For this reason, some doctors do not establish connections that could encourage them to continue working in the regions.
„This is the reality, which is quite uncomfortable to talk about publicly,“ said the doctor.
According to him, educational institutions find it convenient for young doctors to spend as much time as possible in large centers and gain knowledge there.
Among other things, he emphasized that even now, universities do not recruit students willing to study state-funded specialties that are lacking in the regions, so it is naive to expect that doctors will choose places with an obligation to work off.
„There is definitely a problem somewhere with our system and the attractiveness and prestige of those specialties,“ pondered the head of the Young Doctors Association.
According to L. Maciulevičius, government institutions have looked at this problem quite superficially.
The results of the 2023 updated study by the Government Strategic Analysis Center predict that in 2032 there will be a shortage of 269 family doctors, 207 internal medicine doctors, 146 pediatricians, and 134 emergency medicine doctors.
Meanwhile, according to data collected by the Ministry of Health on vacant jobs, in the second half of 2024, the greatest shortage of doctors was in the Šiauliai and Utena regions.
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