The Nursing Union (SATSE) has once again warned that, for another summer, numerous health centers and hospitals have been affected by the shortage of midwives, which, in their view, prevents ensuring adequate and safe care for women and newborns.
The organization emphasizes that the "common origin" of these situations, both in Primary Care and in Specialized Care, is the "structural deficit" of midwives in the staff, which "further aggravates" the problems during the summer months.
According to SATSE, the management does not carry out proper coverage of the professionals who are on vacation or who cannot attend their position for reasons beyond their control, such as sick leave or accidents.
"This reality must be joined by a progressive disincentive in remuneration of a fully consolidated nursing specialty, especially in the field of Primary Care, leading these professionals to earn less than the rest of the nurses," it points out.
The union emphasizes that the insufficiency of midwives forces those who remain active in the summer to chain overtime hours, double shifts, and take on a patient load much higher than what would correspond to them.
In health centers, SATSE explains that the lack of staff during the summer period causes the closure of schedules or forces midwives to take charge of their colleagues' schedules at "zero cost," which implies extending their working day or prioritizing what they can attend to. "Something that, in addition to an internal ethical debate, produces harmful effects on the health of midwives, and makes it impossible for them to reconcile their work and personal life," the union highlights.
The result, the organization adds, is that patients suffer cancellations and delays in consultations, programs, training workshops, and other services, or are forced to travel to another health center to be attended by a midwife.
Specifically, benefits such as timely monitoring of pregnancy and postpartum and breastfeeding consultations, as well as activities related to pelvic floor recovery, cervical cancer screening, or guidance on contraceptive methods and sexual-affective health, among others, are restricted or postponed until after the summer.
Problems in hospitals and delivery services
In the hospital field, the union has alerted in recent weeks to situations recorded in centers such as those in Guadalajara, Palma de Mallorca, or Valencia, among others, which have resulted in a "significant deterioration" in the care that women and their children need, in addition to a negative impact on the physical and psychological health of the midwives.
In this context, SATSE considers it "absolutely unjustifiable" that, as has happened in the Delivery Unit of the Hospital of Guadalajara, they have ended up working with half of the midwives planned in their functional plan, or that they have been forced to extend the shift for the professionals who were coming off the night shift, exposing them to a high level of fatigue, exhaustion, and stress, with direct consequences on the safety of the patients.
A critical situation has also occurred in the Maternal and Child Area of the Son Espases Hospital, in Palma de Mallorca, with a shortfall of nine midwives in the delivery room and the maternity ward, which represents almost 20 percent of the staff unfilled. In addition, several professionals have requested transfers to other communities, such as Andalusia, due to the "unsustainable" situation they faced daily.
At the Clinical University Hospital of Valencia, SATSE denounces that the structural lack of midwives in the Delivery area has been maintained for more than two years, without the Management having implemented stable measures that guarantee a sufficient, adequate, and safe staffing.
Exhausted staff and lack of planning
"These are situations that are suffered, to a greater or lesser extent, in a large number of health centers and hospitals where the care that women who are going to be mothers need is guaranteed, although not under the best conditions, thanks to the work of increasingly tired, demotivated, and frustrated staff," points out the union organization.
SATSE also regrets that, especially in Primary Care, it is the midwives themselves who have to look for colleagues willing to cover their shifts when their personal or work situation requires it, even resorting to "informal" tools such as a WhatsApp group.
The union reproaches the managements for not being able to guarantee adequate planning and coordination of workdays, as they do not find the necessary reinforcements to ensure continuity of care in the centers.