ICU Doctor from Timișoara Warns: New Pay Law Risks Driving Away Medical Staff

Raluca Velovan, a doctor in the ICU Department of Timișoara County Hospital, is raising the alarm about the new Pay Act, which she considers a risk to retaining the medical staff currently keeping the system afloat. She says that after the difficult years endured during the pandemic and the sacrifices made by healthcare workers, the message now being sent is that their work is worth less.

Raluca Velovan completed part of her residency in Ireland, where she witnessed first-hand how a healthcare system that respects and protects its staff operates. Nevertheless, she chose to return to Romania to practise medicine here and put the experience she had gained abroad to good use.

"We were the ones who held their hands in their final moments"

The doctor recalled the pandemic period, when ICU staff worked under extreme conditions — long shifts, no breaks — staying by the side of patients who were dying without any family present.

"Those were years when ICU wards became the boundary between life and death. We wore protective equipment for hours on end without being able to drink a glass of water. We watched people die without their families beside them, and we were the ones who held their hands in their final moments. And today, after all of that, the message we receive is that our work is worth less," said Raluca Velovan.

The risk of young doctors leaving

The doctor warns that a hospital cannot function on state-of-the-art equipment and modern buildings alone — above all, it needs well-trained people. She believes the new pay measures may discourage young doctors from staying in Romania, particularly within a system where workloads are already extremely high.

"How do you persuade a well-trained young doctor to stay in Romania? How do you tell them it is worth investing years of their life in a system that pushes them towards burnout and then tells them their sacrifice is up for negotiation? How do you build a high-performing healthcare system when you are discouraging the very people keeping it alive?" the doctor asked.

"I am not asking for privileges. I am asking for respect"

Raluca Velovan emphasises that this issue does not affect doctors alone, but the entire hospital workforce: nurses, care assistants, porters, receptionists, and auxiliary staff — all of whom are essential to the running of medical facilities and the care of patients.

"I am not asking for privileges. I am asking for respect. I am asking for decisions that keep professionals in this country, not ones that push them to leave. Because when the last people who still believe in this system give up, it will not be the doctors who foot the bill," the doctor said.