By Karina De Mattos.
The summary of a surgeon denounced by residents of the Salto Hospital of exercising workplace harassment is public knowledge. CAMBIO received Surgeon Dr. Martín Salvatierra, who made his discharges and explained details of the difficult situation he is going through at the labor level.
-How have the events that lead you to the summary happened?
-This began in March-April 2020, with the change of government and the appointment of the new regional director of ASSE, Dr. Bruno. I was relieved of my position as interim chief of surgery and the call for a contest for the head of the surgery service was lowered. At that time I was in charge of both the block and the surgery service on an interim basis and I had previously been in charge of the admission of Dr. Patricia Barusso who was the one who appointed me temporarily, I was integrated in the management as deputy director of the surgical anesthetic pole . When Dr. Bruno enters, he brings all the anesthetics-surgical men together in the auditorium and in a rather humiliating way informs me that they relieved me of my charges because these were an invention of the Frente Amplio. I was a tenured surgeon by competition and an adjunct professor by competition.
The position of interim chief was by direct appointment of Dr. Barusso. At that time, they placed Dr. Alfredo Abelleira – husband of the departmental director of the Ministry of Public Health – in my position. At that time I already saw a very dark time arrive for our entire work project. At that time, Abelleira’s appointment went viral for political reasons. That reaches the ears of the General Manager of ASSE, Dr. Eduardo Henderson, makes a Zoom with authorities of the School of Medicine and there he says that he is going to divide the service in two. The surgery and the faculty called the Unidad Docente Asistencial (UDA), of which I had been in charge for years. At that moment he addresses me speaking badly, blaming me that the news of the change of position has gone viral. There the nightmare begins.
– Was there workplace harassment of residents?
-The residents, whom I was training to be surgeons, come into contact with Abelleira and were manipulated. Because I have a work model and training background of more than six generations of surgeons for the region and I have a work model focused on people and good service and accepted by ASSE, approved by Dr. Millán. I recognize that my work model is quite strict, especially since I am the guarantor when you bring a surgeon to work, it has to be good. I made a few mistakes in the process but I didn’t do badly in surgeon training. Most appreciate the way I had to train them. Manipulated, the boys made a complaint to me, that they did not agree with the demanding way of treating them. I send a letter to the observatory of the Faculty of Medicine and ask the dean to investigate if necessary in summary form. Henderson contacts the dean and takes the complaint and sends it to the Workplace Harassment Commission. They call to testify the only official that we summoned with the previous director for bad behavior, Dr. Abelleira and the nephew Dr. JO Blanco. Those were the witnesses, totally biased. They had 15 days to be issued and it took 6 months, when I fell summary and separation from office.
-Who is leading this smear campaign and why?
-For having worked with the Frente Amplio government. Let us remember that we did the pediatric ICS, the pediatric emergency, we reformed the surgical block, we brought in laparoscopic surgery, and so on. They discharged the 14-year-old block UDA started by Dr. Néstor Campos for political reasons. For personal political reasons, because the Dr. Abelleira who wanted my position is the husband of Dr. Rosa Blanco and Dr. Henderson have a personal crony relationship with Bruno, Blanco and Abelleira. Here the victims were the residents. I publicly state that if residents were offended at any time, I apologize publicly, my intention has always been to train good professionals.
