by InTrieste
Friuli Venezia Giulia’s newly expanded non-emergency medical hotline, 116-117, received more than 30,000 calls in its first month of regional operation, health officials said this week.
The service, launched across the region on April 13 after an initial pilot phase in Trieste, handled 30,844 calls in its first 30 days. Officials said 86 percent of requests were resolved during the first contact.
“This number is expected to grow as more residents become familiar with the service,” said Alberto Peratoner, head of Trieste’s emergency services, during a press briefing.
The hotline, designed to streamline non-urgent healthcare assistance, recorded an average waiting time of 1 minute and 26 seconds, with calls lasting about three minutes on average. Demand peaked during holidays and weekends, particularly in late mornings and between 8 p.m. and 9:30 p.m.
Nearly 19,000 calls involved continuity-of-care requests, often from residents unable to reach their family doctors.
“When a doctor is unavailable, we assess whether the issue can wait,” Peratoner said. “If not, we help patients find another physician or direct them to a community health center.”
Officials said the new system replaces a fragmented network of more than 40 separate services, creating a single regional coordination point for non-emergency medical care.
