A Look At Vatican Health Care and The Pope's Doctors

I am still awaiting the full English Translation of the Holy Father's Angelus from yesterday. I intend to do a post on it next with pics and news articles (and addthe text later when it comes) next. However I saw this translated from the Vatican Newspaper's Aug 2 edition and thought it was interesting. It is a interview with Giovanni Rocchi, director of the Vatican's Office of Health and Hygiene. Which is basically the Vatican's Doctor Office.

About the Vatican's health system and its emergency services


Is there a special emergency service for the Pope?

Of course - entirely in keeping with how the practice of medicine has evolved. You know that in the past, Popes rarely went out of the Vatican. Not even for medical treatment or surgery. Without going back too far in time, I would remind you that for Paul VI, the surgeons simply improvised an operating room in the Papal apartment when he required prostate surgery. But since the 1980s, precisely because of advances in emergency medicine, it was obvious that a physician's house call was no longer enough to assist the Pope medically.

Assistance to the Pope was and continues to be the principal focus of this organization. So, the state-of-the-art requires that there should always be on call a specialist in resuscitation who is able, when necessary, to stabilize the patient clinically while he is transported to the nearest hospital to get the appropriate full treatment. This system was operational right after the assassination attempt on John Paul II on May 13, 1981. Just the day before, Papa Wojtyla had visited our offices and blessed the first ambulance equipped for emergency resuscitation that had been donated to the Vatican.

That same ambulance brought him the next day to the Policlinico Gemelli, after the shooting at St. Peter's Square. Since then, wherever the Pope is, a properly equipped emergency ambulance with a qualified medical team is always standing by.

Even when the Pope is at the Vatican and does not have any official activities?

It is always nearby and ready. Because it can also be used for others who require such services. It is available 24/7. [I am sure the same system is operative when the Pope is travelling. In New York, the Papal motorcade always included an ambulance. In between events, it was parked the next street over from the Nunciature.]

How many doctors does the Vatican system employ?

We have 16 internists (specialists in internal/general medicine) on staff. Then we have 11 others on contract, 51 specialists in the various medical specialities, and 21 other substitute internists.