The state health services organisation (Okypy) clarified on Friday that transferring patients with postoperative complications from private to public hospitals is a standard medical practice, responding to complaints from former health minister and Disy MP George Pamboridis concerning a patient.

Okypy said the taking over of cases with postoperative complications from the private sector was “a frequent occurrence for public hospitals”, pointing out that two patients with complications had been transferred from a private hospital to Limassol general hospital during the current week alone.

Regarding the case raised by Pamboridis, Okypy spokesman Charalambos Charilaou said the patient had been receiving treatment at a private hospital before developing serious postoperative complications, resulting in her admission to the accident and emergency department at Nicosia general hospital.

Okypy outright denied that doctors had “refused to provide the necessary medical care”, saying that transferring her care to the general hospital had been assessed as “the most appropriate choice”.

The organisation said the case had been discussed the previous day between doctors at Nicosia general hospital and the private hospital, as well as with Okypy officials.

During those discussions, it was made clear that “if there was a real inability of the private hospital to provide the required care and the patient’s condition would be more appropriately handled by the Nicosia general hospital, the incident should be taken over”.

Okypy described this as standard practice, saying public hospitals receive referrals of complex cases from private hospitals on a daily basis.

Okypy reiterated that any hospital undertaking specific procedures must maintain appropriate staffing and capacity to safely manage the cases it takes on, along with any complications that may reasonably arise.

The organisation said the more pressing issue concerned the conditions under which specialised services were being provided, questioning how a top-tier private hospital could carry out procedures but be unable to manage complications arising from them.

Okypy’s response followed a public complaint by Pamboridis, who alleged that a woman suffering postoperative complications had been refused admission to the private hospital’s emergency department because of a lack of beds before being transferred to Nicosia general hospital.

Pamboridis described such practices as “reprehensible” and said he had reported the incident to the patient ombudsman.