Central Intensive Care at the University Clinical Center of Kosovo is facing a severe shortage of anesthesiologists and nurses.
This unit of the Anesthesiology Clinic, which almost always operates at full capacity, treated around 500 patients in critical condition last year.
The Head of Central Intensive Care at UCCK, Shaqir Uka, tells KosovaPress that November 2025 has been challenging, as the number of admitted patients has tripled. The unit, which has only 21 beds available, has operated at 99 percent utilization throughout the previous year.
"The Central Intensive Care Unit at the University Clinical Center has 21 active beds, which are always occupied 99 percent of the time. During this year, from January to this moment when we are talking, we have had 495 patients admitted and treated in the Central Intensive Care Unit... During November of this year, we surprisingly had 62 patients admitted to intensive care, which is three times our capacity," says Uka.
He adds that in these cases it is very difficult to manage, as those patients need treatment.
"We had to manage the situation with the patients we had... This is made even more difficult when we consider the limited number of anesthesiologists our clinic has," says Uka.
According to him, the number of patients referred to this clinic remains almost unchanged from year to year, while the uniqueness of 2025 is the aggravated condition of patients for treatment.
In the Central Intensive Care Unit at UCCK from January to mid-December of last year, around 120 patients died, mainly from serious injuries in traffic accidents and falls at work, while cases of deaths from firearms decreased.
"There have been patients who have had illnesses that were impossible to manage from a medical perspective, very serious injuries, very serious damage, even to brain tissue, most of them, injuries in traffic accidents. We have had many falls from height this year of workers who have lost their lives due to injuries they received at their workplaces. Then, there are gunshot injuries, with injuries with cold weapons, which fortunately, I say fortunately, are decreasing every year," says Uka.
He says that for a better function in Intensive Care, the number of staff needs to be tripled.
"At the moment we have six teams, each with two anesthesiologists, who work in intensive care, that is, they maintain 24-hour care in intensive care. This becomes even more difficult, meaning that it is up to us to maintain care every sixth day... This, in addition to physical fatigue, has extremely large repercussions in the emotional, psychological and other aspects... We are already at the stage when new colleagues are completing their specialization," says Uka.
He emphasizes that the competition for their admission is expected to be made public soon, and this will at least somewhat alleviate the generally aggravated situation at the Clinic of Anesthesiology and Intensive Care.
"However, even with this number that will be accepted now, this may alleviate the situation a little, but to be completely comfortable and to perform normal work, the number of anesthesiologists would have to be tripled from the number we have right now... Now there are somewhere in the Clinical Center, there are somewhere around 45-47 anesthesiologists in total. Here we have 12, there are six teams with two anesthesiologists each," says Uka.
Considering them as heroes of this clinic, Uka says that the Central Intensive Care Unit also suffers from a shortage of nurses, who are not enough. He says that requests for additional nursing staff are constantly for 20-25 nurses, but that usually only 4-5 are accepted.
"A chronic problem, which has continued for years, and remains unresolved, is the lack of middle staff, as well as auxiliary staff, especially middle staff. In the standards, a nurse, for example, was supposed to have her work activity with two patients at most, or two nurses with three patients. And here, most of the time, a nurse has to do her work with three patients, sometimes even with four patients," Uka emphasizes for KosovaPress.
The Head of Central Intensive Care at UCCK considers that it is not necessary to increase the capacities in this clinic, but to make intensive care units functional in other clinics. According to Uka, over 30 percent of patients are treated in this clinic due to the lack of other intensive care units.
"Realistically, our capacities were not supposed to increase any more. The intensive care units in other clinics were supposed to be activated, so that the Neurology Clinic could also treat patients who breathe with a ventilator. The Infectious Diseases Clinic has an intensive care unit, but it has few beds, and they are also hesitant to take a patient who needs ventilator treatment. The Internal Medicine Clinic does not have an intensive care unit and we have many patients, somewhere around 18% of the patients we treat here are their patients, who should have received treatment there. Thus, our efforts at the level of the central directorate, by the directorate of the Anesthesiology Clinic, are directed in that sense so that their intensive care units can be functionalized," Uka declares.
The Central Intensive Care Unit says that they are equipped with modern medical equipment, including ventilators and monitoring devices, which are the latest in medical technology. Even in terms of the supply of medicines and medical supplies during 2025, this clinic fared well, although it was emphasized that there were occasional shortages. /KP/
