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Waiting times in Greater Lisbon emergency rooms reach nine hours

Patients with yellow wristbands at Amadora-Sintra Hospital face long waits of up to nine hours.

21 August 2026Tagblick Newsdesk

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Archive photo: Waiting times in Greater Lisbon emergency rooms reach nine hours — Archive photoPhoto: Esquerda.Net Flickr · Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 2.0

Amadora-Sintra Hospital reported that urgent patients, identified with yellow wristbands, are facing wait times that can reach up to nine hours to be seen by a doctor. This information was made available on Friday morning but is not found on the National Health Service (SNS) portal.

According to information from other hospitals in Portugal, waiting times in emergency rooms can vary from two to fifteen hours, but Amadora-Sintra is the only hospital that does not present this data on the public platform.

Healthcare professionals have expressed concern over the situation, which keeps some patient care outside normal standards. The waiting conditions in emergency rooms are impacting both patients and the work of health services.

Additionally, there are reports that the capacity of emergency services in the metropolitan area of Lisbon is being challenged, with the constant increase in patient visits resulting in long wait times.

The lack of data on the SNS portal regarding waiting times at Amadora-Sintra hinders transparency and monitoring of the situation, contributing to many patients being unaware of what to expect when seeking medical care.

The situation in Lisbon's emergency rooms underscores the need for improvements in public health and the urgency of measures aimed at reducing waiting times, especially with the arrival of winter and increased demand for health services.

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