translated from Spanish: They demand the closure of Clínica Dávila for denying care if there is no prepayment

Senator Guido Girardi (PPD), author of the law that prohibits the use of cheque in collateral as a condition in health care, along with relatives of patients, reported that the Dávila Clinic requires the prior deposit of cash before attending patient, even in cases of emergency. Therefore, the senator announced that he will ask the Superintendency of Health to force the clinic to return the required amount, as well as the term of registration of the care precinct “because the fines are derisory and must have an exemplary punishment”. In addition, he noted that he will support the affected families in the filing of an appeal for protection and civil actions against the establishment of Health.TESTIMONIOSOn the morning of August 14 last Maria Teresa Buffo Farías of 92 years suffered a fall, ribs and was left with difficulty breathing. Her daughter, Silvia Marcos, remembers that “she has Fonasa and we take her to the urgency of the Dávila Clinic. They evaluated her and said she had to be hospitalized in the ICU and we had to deposit three million pesos in cash. Otherwise, we had to hire a private ambulance to take her somewhere else. We are a large and close-knit family and we managed to raise only two million so at 8 p.m. they entered a common room. We had no idea about the emergency law.” On November 28th, María Cecilia Andrade Pérez, 58, arrived until the urgency of the same clinic with a severe kidney infection. Her daughter Magdalena remembers that “kidneys do tests and tell me that she was complicated and that she should be hospitalized, but first you must go to fundraiser to see how to cancel. I tell you, but if it’s an emergency, I get it that I must have $992. 000 in cash or else they were going to discharge you… and it was four in the morning.” “Because of these situations of abuse there is so much outrage in this country. We made the law that prohibits the check in collateral and the emergency law that requires to attend for free until the patient is stabilized and can be derived, but they do not respect them and prefer to pay the fines because the amounts are derisory,” he said. The parliamentarian stated that “we will make a presentation at the Superintendency of Health to ask you to close this company that already has a record of similar irregularities, so we want them to pay the fine and have their registration completed.” We will also file a protective appeal and support these families in a civil lawsuit because here there is moral harm from the pain, frustration and anger of having to beg to save a loved one’s life,” he said. The senator stated that “perhaps many families failed to get the money and the patient passed away. That is why I ask all those who have had similar problems with this clinic, to send us the background to act for the good of Chilean society and to end these kinds of abuses that outrage and are intolerable.”

Original source in Spanish