Valeggio Hospital Transfer Delayed to August Amid Coordination Challenges
Delay in the Transfer of Valeggio Hospital
The handover of the hospital (pictured) from Asl 22 to the Verona Hospital Company has been postponed. The Hospital Center with Clinic Status, as the healthcare facility destined to become a center for research and high-specialization rehabilitation, will be transferred into the dependency of the Verona-based company and the university, barring further delays, starting from August 1st. The delay is due to the still-unorganized coordination between Verona’s hospital activities and those of Valeggio.
The deadline was decided during a meeting attended by the general directors of Asl 22, Filippo Marelli, and of the Verona Healthcare Company, Michele Romano, the dean of the Medicine Faculty of Verona, Giuseppe Tridente, the mayor of Valeggio, Fausto Sachetto, and the vice-president of the Regional Council, Angelo Fiorin. During the meeting, Romano explained the organizational difficulties, but the firm will to complete the operation was reaffirmed.
Service Organization and Economic Impacts
Asl 22 and the Hospital Company are now finalizing the organization of services. However, the management of some of these services will not be directly transferred to the University. Michele Benamati, Director of Administration at Asl 22, explains: “The measures are still being refined, but our company will continue to manage directly, at least for a certain period, the unified appointment booking center, the digestive endoscopy service, radiology, and dialysis, and will ensure the immediate availability of laboratory analysis and radiology technicians. The health district providing medical services to the population will also depend on Asl 22.”
“The handover from the hospital to the Verona-based Company should notably ease the budget of Asl 22,” adds Benamati, “because while it will lose the revenue from hospitalizations of patients coming from all over Italy to Valeggio for treatment—and we will, in fact, need to indemnify the University for patients from 22 who will be hospitalized there in the future—on the other side, the health authority led by Marelli will no longer have to pay 110 employees’ salaries.” Moreover, it will not have to spend billions of its own funds to complete the two building floors that have been left unfinished for years.
The mayor Sachetto is pleased with how things are progressing: “Finally,” he comments, “we have a definite date for the management transfer of the facility, and I thank the leadership of the hospital companies, the University, and the Region for this. After years of uncertainty, Valeggio will now be able to have an advanced rehabilitation center (vascular, orthopedic, gastroenterological) and simultaneously continue providing the healthcare services currently offered to Valeggio residents.”
