Miguel Alpalhão refuses to respond to deputies
Dermatologist Miguel Alpalhão — who earned 400 thousand in just ten Saturdays from additional surgeries at the Hospital de Santa Maria — refused to appear before the Health Committee of the Assembly of the Republic, where he was due to be heard this Wednesday. In the response sent to the president of the Health Committee, to which Observador had access, Miguel Alpalhão says he is not qualified to comment on the weaknesses in SIGIC and considers it “untimely” to provide clarifications on the subject before being heard by the inspection and judicial entities.
“I would like to thank you for your kind invitation to a hearing on 9/7/2025, which I will however have to respectfully decline” , writes Miguel Alpalhão, in response to the invitation to travel to the Assembly of the Republic, which had been sent by the president of the Health Committee, deputy Filipe Neto Brandão.
“From the text that motivates the call, it can be seen that the main objective of the hearing will be to identify possible weaknesses in the organic process of SIGIC”, begins by saying the 33-year-old doctor , concluding that he is not “qualified to discuss the issues” that the Health Commission intends to address. Miguel Alpalhão argues, in the letter, that the discussion is up to “those who have administrative, management, supervision, management and/or auditing functions”.
Stressing that he could only respond to the deputies about his clinical activity as a doctor and as a coder, Alpalhão argues that it would be “ untimely to provide clarifications and draw political conclusions in this regard, in the absence of factual data, which are being collected”.
The doctor — suspected of having committed irregularities in the coding of additional surgeries performed at the Santa Maria Dermatology Service — considers “that it would not be appropriate to respond to questions in parliament before being heard by the inspection and judicial authorities” , to whom, he assures, he requested, from the beginning, through legal representation, “an urgent hearing”.
Dermatologist from Santa Maria totaled almost 715 thousand euros, but the coding would be correct
“In the absence of factual data from the multiple audits carried out and in progress, any response that may be offered will lack substance and will be open more to interpretations and considerations than to conclusions, a situation that will benefit no one, nor will it clarify anything”, concludes Miguel Alpalhão.
Since 2021, when he began performing additional surgeries, until last year, the dermatologist performed a total of 497 additional surgeries at the Hospital de Santa Maria, for which he earned 714,829 euros, according to calculations made by the newspaper Expresso . In just ten Saturdays, in the years 2023 and 2024, Alpalhão earned 400 thousand euros , CNN Portugal had previously reported.
Unlike what happens in Parliamentary Commissions of Inquiry, people invited to respond to deputies in sectoral Commissions of the Assembly of the Republic are not obliged to appear .
Miguel Alpalhão has, so far, been the only one to refuse to respond to the deputies. This Tuesday, at 3 pm, the hearings on the case of additional surgeries in the Santa Maria Dermatology Unit will begin, with the hearing of Carlos das Neves Martins, Chairman of the Board of Directors of the ULS Santa Maria and Carlos Carapeto, Inspector General of Health Activities.
This Wednesday, at 9 am, it is the turn of Paulo Filipe, former Director of the Dermatology Service at ULS Santa Maria, who resigned following the case. All were called at the request of Chega and Iniciativa Liberal.
observador
