Untalan: CHC may stop elective surgery

The Commonwealth Health Center may have to curtail elective surgeries if they are not able to hire another anesthesiologist, said Pete Untalan, deputy secretary for Hospital Administration.

CHC currently employs two anesthesiologists, but one is leaving soon and the other one has indicated he is reluctant to stay on board if he is the sole anesthesiologist at the hospital, Untalan said.

He said hospital officials have been looking for a third anesthesiologist for about a year but have been unsuccessful.

“The primary issue is salary,” he said in an e-mail. “[There is] a [v]ery big discrepancy from our current salary to what Guam is advertising to recruit this type of practitioner.”

Salaries for medical professionals currently are capped at $50,000, but the House and Senate have passed a bill raising the cap. It is currently awaiting Gov. Benigno Fitial’s signature to become law.

Fitial earlier vetoed a bill exempting medical professionals, attorneys, accountants, engineers, and architects working in government from the $50,000 cap. The bill also would have allowed unspecified professionals working at the Legislature and the Judiciary to receive up to $60,000 a year. Fitial vetoed the bill because he said the language was too broad and too vague.