COSTA RICA NEWS – Between three and four appeals are received daily by the Constitutional Court (Sala Constitucional) of patients seeking accelerated appointments at Caja Costarricense del Seguro Social (CCSS) state medical centres.
These are number of cases that the magistrates of the Court refer to an average daily to the medical management of the CCSS before a final decision on each case. According to the medical manager of the CCSS, Dr. María Eugenia Villalta, most of the times the magistrates respect the criteria of the CCSS, but in other cases the health centres are ordered to provide patients with earlier appointments.
Villalta stressed that the majority of appeals are in orthopedic services and surgery, where the waiting lists are long.
The medical centres that having the most orders issued against them are the hospitals San Juan de Dios, México and Calderón Guardia in San José and the San Vicente de Paul in Heredia, the Max Peralta in Cartago and the San Rafael in Alajuela.
On Friday (July 11) the magistrates of the Constitutional Court ordered the Hospital Fernando Escalante Pradilla in Pérez Zeledón to accelerate the 2022 appointment for a gastroscopy of a 66 year old woman waiting a hernia operation.
Source: CCSS; Amelia Rueda
