It will be unprecedented in Portugal and will allow the training of young doctors and nurses with «first world conditions». On the way, the future University Health Center of Loulé, whose financing model was made official yesterday, will give dignity to the USF Lauroé and UCC Gentes de Loulé.
To get there, it will still be necessary to approve the execution project. Then, when the work starts, there will be some constraints, since the building to be built will be installed next to the current Health Center in Louletano, behind and beside the containers that house the Lauroé Family Health Unit.
But the money, which is often the hardest to come by, is assured. To do this work will be necessary «3,7 million euros, plus VAT», revealed Vítor Aleixo, mayor of Loulé. «Of this amount, the municipality contributes 65% and the remaining 35% will be provided by the Ministry of Health, through the Regional Health Administration of the Algarve», revealed the mayor of Louletano.
The new health center should be a reality in about two years, if all goes as planned.
These statements were made to journalists on the sidelines of the ceremony for the signing of the inter-administrative contract for the construction/expansion of the University Health Center of Loulé, a protocol that frames the partnership between the City Council and the ARS in financing the work.
The act was attended by Jamila Madeira, Secretary of State for Health, who returned to her homeland, Loulé, to sponsor a process that it officially launched itself in February.
Although this is a work "long demanded by Loulé people" and that Vítor Aleixo is "sure" that it will be "one of the most awaited" by the municipality's population, due to the improvement in conditions that it will bring to two of the centre's functional units, it is the university component that gives it a special character.
For Vítor Aleixo, «the corollary of this strategic project that the Chamber is developing in partnership with the University of Algarve, through its Academic Center [Algarve Biomedical Center], is the first University Health Center in the country, which will be born and will be linked to the university'.
"We are going to have a University Health Center where it will be possible, at the same time as users are consulted, to train new doctors", summarized the mayor of Loulé.
Both the mayor of Louletano and Paulo Morgado, president of ARS do Algarve, speak of a «vision of the future», that «primary health care, and specifically the Health Centers, will become places where we do pre and post education. graduate".
Not that this work is not already done, at least in part. But the conditions are not the best. «We already do pre-graduate education here in Loulé and in other Health Centers in the region, but without the right conditions. The students of the Medicine course at the University of Algarve have classes in a number of Health Centers in the region», framed Paulo Morgado.
Now, with the construction of this new equipment, «which is a national pioneer, we have a building that is prepared from scratch for teaching».
«At the new Health Center in Loulé, medical students will have classes and be taught by their masters in first-world conditions, let's say. We will also have our doctors, nurses and other technicians in training, who will take advantage of these facilities and this equipment to learn, to be better professionals, which, deep down, is what we all aspire to», summarized the president of the ARS of Algarve.
In addition to this teaching component, the new building will also improve the response given to users.
“This is a building for health, with several features. First, it aims to replace a Family Health Unit (USF) that has been installed in Loulé since the beginning, in very precarious conditions. Popular memory still remembers a very regrettable episode, in which the doctor opened the umbrella inside a container of that unit, to consult users», explained Vítor Aleixo.
“So that these situations do not happen again, we have designed, in collaboration with the ARS and, naturally, with the support of the Ministry of Health, this new building, where the USF Lauroé will have decent facilities”, he added.
The new building will also house the Community Care Unit (UCC) Gentes de Loulé, "which will be endowed with more ample and modern facilities, so that its professionals can exercise their functions with another dignity," said the mayor.
Paulo Morgado, for his part, considered that “this new building responds to a very important need at the Loulé Health Center. At this moment, a part of our functional units installed there are in precarious accommodation and this penalizes users and professionals a lot. These are conditions that are by no means the most worthy».
«Fundamentally, what we are giving, with this project, is more quality to users and professionals, to also attract those who want to settle in our region and in this municipality», he said.
In the case of the USF Lauroé, a unit that serves 13.700 users of the municipality, «including some from rural parishes», it will be possible to remove it from the temporary facilities it has occupied since its creation.
The UCC Gentes de Loulé, "which is the largest in the region and which is also in relatively precarious and very small facilities", will find in the new building "other conditions to be able to function", said the president of the ARS do Algarve.
Secretary of State Jamila Madeira assured, for her part, that this is just one of the investments that the Government has been thinking about for the Algarve.
“We have a strategic health investment plan under construction. In fact, there is a part of it that has already been incorporated into the NHS response improvement plan, which we approved in December. This investment that we were ratifying today is planned there and has been cherished since the first moment», said the Secretary of State for Health.
“There is a reinforcement of primary health care, which allows for a reinforced response, in a first line. And, obviously, there is another reinforcement of humanization and proximity to users», he added.
As for the new Central Hospital of the Algarve, whose urgency was highlighted by Vítor Aleixo, Jamila Madeira assured that "in this legislature, as is the Government's commitment, there will be clear advances" in relation to this equipment.
«The Hospital Central do Algarve is a project that was included in the Great Options of the Plan for this legislature. It is a file that is on the table, specifically mine and the minister. It's a theme that we're both following up and evolving as quickly as possible. At the moment, I can't tell you anything more concrete», summarized the secretary of state in the Algarve.
In addition to this large investment in the Health Center in the municipality's capital, the Câmara de Loulé is preparing investments in the Health Extension of Almancil and the Health Center of Quarteira.
In the first case, it is a rehabilitation and expansion work, which will cover an area of 200 square meters and will make it possible to double the size of this unit.
This will be possible because the Almancilense Parish Council, which shares the building with the Health Extension, will be relocated, allowing the advancement of this intervention, which will cost «about 325 thousand euros» and will allow the creation of «eight medical offices and a new room waiting”, according to Joaquim Farrajota, architect of the Câmara de Loulé.
In Quarteira, “a new block with seven medical offices and a treatment room” will be created, which will also have an area of about 200 square meters. This intervention will cost around 200 thousand euros.
In both cases, the process is being carried out in partnership with ARS do Algarve.
Photos: Hugo Rodrigues|Sul Informação
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