---
Following the publication of the report by the Financial Oversight and Management Board and the Department of Health on the crisis in medical services on the island, the Health Services Administrators Association (CASS by its acronym in Spanish) is recommending the creation of a permanent task force that brings together all sectors of the industry to implement concrete and sustainable solutions.
“The [oversight board-commissioned] study confirms what health services administrators have been pointing out for years: the shortage of specialist physicians, the fragmentation of the system, and the lack of access to essential services continue to affect the quality of patient care,” said CASS President Dr. Rosa Castro, who is a physician and licensed health services administrator by profession. “It is important to conduct studies, collect data, and present reports with strategies to a working committee, but if real mechanisms for action and execution are not established in the short, medium, and long term, efforts will remain just another study. We need a continuous workspace where the government, hospitals, insurers, health centers, and other sectors develop strategies with success metrics and a commitment to execution.”
The president of the CASS, which represents more than 800 hospital administrators, diagnostic and treatment centers, primary health centers and medical groups, stressed that “the health crisis requires a collaborative approach that transcends planning and translates into viable solutions for our health ecosystem.”
“The [oversight board] report exposes an obvious challenge, but now the challenge is to act,” Castro added. “From the CASS we are ready to be part of the solution and facilitate dialogue between the sectors that make decisions in the health system.”
“The proposal for a permanent task force seeks to address critical issues such as the retention and recruitment of health professionals such as doctors and nurses, prioritizing education and prevention, strengthening graduate medical education, incentives for the labor sector and institutions, and improvements in the distribution of specialized services,” she noted. “We have to do things differently and the oversight mechanisms have to be strengthened.”
