Nine in ten health centers have 3 or more computer failures in one year

Min 91% of the Family Health Units (USF) registered in the last year three or more episodes of unavailability of computer applications and more than 82% registered basic material failures, reveals a study that is presented today.

Conducted by the National Association of Family Health Units (USF-AN), the report “The Current Moment of the Reform of Primary Health Care in Portugal 2025/2026” reveals that all FHUs who answered the questionnaire had at least one episode of unavailability of computer applications.

“ In 91.1% of the FHUs, failures occurred three or more times and, of these, in 15.7%, failures occurred more than 50 times in the year; also 15.7% of FHUs waited more than one day for the replacement of access (10.0% in 2024/25) and 98.7% reported an impact on the quality of care, the highest value of the series ", reads in the report that combines the responses of 541 FHU coordinators.

Currently there are 717 FHUs, but on date (19 June to 4 August this year) of this study were 712.

According to the USF-AN, 76% of the coordinators invited to respond contributed to the study that will be presented today at the 17th National Meeting of the FHU with the motto “Health for All, Commitment for All”, in Gondomar, in the district of Porto.

In statements to the agency Lusa, the president of the USF-AN and coordinator of the study, André Biscaia, warned that “a computer failure is not only a computer failure, it is also a clinical risk situation for the user and a risk to the professional”.

“ Right now we have everything computerized, we have nothing on paper. A computer failure, sometimes for a day, sometimes even more than a day, is working in the dark, is working without any kind of support. It is very serious ", analyzed.

Regarding material shortages, 82.6% of FHUs reported lack of basic material during the year, 22.7% more than 10 times, 31.1% three to 10 times and 28.8% once to twice.

“In 68.6% of the cases the replacement took 48 hours or more,” the study reads.

“ When we are talking about basic material, we are talking about dressing material, some medicines, also vaccines, perfectly central things for what really is the basic and normal care of a FHU. Therefore, all this leads to a great disturbance of activity. And much of the dissatisfaction results from this ", said André Biscaia.

USF-AN has also analysed some applications, such as one that is currently on the agenda, ‘eVacinas’.

“ We are in the middle of the flu vaccination season, and the failures are more than many,” the president of the USF-AN lamented, specifying that “often the system is too slow, sometimes it simply does not work,” which “implies that nurses often have to be vaccinated without being absolutely sure if the person has been vaccinated, or if there is a problem, or if there is some restriction”.

The report reads that “eVacinas deserves special attention this year, for the worst reasons”, since “historically the most well-evaluated application of all those in the study, with satisfaction rates always above 60% since 2020/21, is now falling from 61.9% to 43.7% (less than 18.2 percentage points), the largest retreat ever recorded in this series.”.

“ Although not discriminated against in this study, we believe that the fall is also related to the introduction of ‘eVacinas 2.0’ in April 2026, a long-awaited platform, but whose start was not free of mishaps,” he adds.