Internal Medicine consultations at the Doctor José Molina Orosa University Hospital grew by 45% in 2023. And 5,735 consultations were carried out last year and a total of 1,624 hospitalized patients were treated. These figures represent a significant increase in consultations of 44.39% compared to the 3,972 carried out in 2022. Until May of this year, a total of 2,668 consultations have already been carried out with a slight increase compared to 2023.
The Internal Medicine service works in a coordinated manner with the different levels of care and the rest of the specialties, as highlighted by the volume of interconsultations that internists register in the performance of their work. Thus, from Primary Care, 838 interconsultations were carried out last year, 106 from the Emergency service and 244 interconsultations were added by other hospital teams.
21 percent of hospital stays
The Internal Medicine ward also registers the highest volume of hospital care for patients, with a care load of almost 21 percent of the total hospital stays, which places it in the first position by specialties. The average stay of patients admitted to the Internal Medicine ward during the past year was 7.96 days, a figure that is within the state average. In the first months of 2024, 644 patients have been admitted to this ward and the stay has been significantly reduced to an average of 5.64 days.
Chronic, complex and multi-pathological patients
On the other hand, the internists of Molina Orosa assist more than half of the patients hospitalized in the Internal Medicine ward, specifically and depending on their pathology and the cause of admission, they attend to 52% of them. In this hospitalization area, patients admitted for other pathologies are also treated, who are attended by their respective specialists.
The internist specialists address different types of conditions, although a high percentage of the patients treated are patients with chronic diseases, with a higher vascular risk, complex and multi-pathological.
The Molina Orosa service offers them all comprehensive and quality care that addresses prevention, diagnosis and treatment. For this, it has five external consultations in addition to the specific ones for infectious diseases and the rapid diagnosis consultation for suspected oncological pathology.
Internal medicine, the main ward of Molina Orosa
The Internal Medicine ward of Molina Orosa has always occupied a central place in hospital activity. Its configuration has been modified over time and has been adapted, according to the head of service, Covadonga Rodríguez, "to respond to the changing and growing needs of the society of Lanzarote that condition our work such as demographic growth or the aging of the population".
From an initial allocation of three doctors, seven nurses and a dozen beds when the Hospital opened 35 years ago, it currently has ten internists, twenty-four nurses and 44 beds.
The head of nursing of this service, Elena Rivera, emphasizes that the Internal Medicine ward was the cradle of the Hematological and Oncological Day Hospitals of Molina Orosa. "The first treatments for patients with leukemia began to be carried out in a room on ward l." On the other hand, she explains that "the ward housed patients who required intensive care and those who needed palliative care, nursing tasks that they complemented with others such as diabetological education or the management of venous catheters".
Teaching vocation
Since 2020, the service has been accredited by the Ministry of Health to train Resident Internal Physicians (MIR) in the specialty of Internal Medicine and is currently responsible for the training of four residents, which entails the effort of implementing research and teaching through publications.
