Lleida health centres will take on a record 93 resident doctors and nurses next month, after all specialised health training places offered by the Ministry of Health were filled. That is four more than in 2025.
Hospital Arnau de Vilanova will host 67 new residents, including 48 medical residents (MIR). The hospital has added one place in Anatomical Pathology and its first place in the new Emergency and Urgencies speciality. It will also have 12 new resident nurses, two more than in 2025, as Obstetrics and Gynaecology midwifery training rises from three to five places.
Primary Care keeps its 16 family medicine MIR places. It was the only medical speciality still with places available on the final day of allocations, but these were filled in the end. In 2024, five family medicine places in Lleida were left vacant, although three were later filled in a second round for non-EU doctors opened by the ministry. In 2023, one place remained vacant in the region, and in 2022, ten places were initially unfilled.
At Arnau de Vilanova, the first Emergency MIR place was taken by a candidate who had the best score in Catalonia and the fifth best in Spain for that speciality. Oriol Yuguero, territorial head of Urgencies, said the candidate had asked about the hospital, completed a rotation there, and chose it over the other seven ICS hospitals.
Josep Montserrat, coordinator of the Lleida teaching unit, said the first seven residents to choose one of the 16 family medicine MIR places this year are from Lleida. He said the full allocation showed a favourable trend in recruitment and retention. In 2019, there were no Lleida residents in this speciality, while 12 of the 15 who will finish training this year are expected to stay and work in Lleida, mostly in Primary Care.
The College of Nurses of Lleida said the five Obstetrics places are not enough and said the area needs at least 120 more midwives. Nationally, the MIR allocation period ended yesterday, with the final 171 family medicine places filled. Of the 2,544 family medicine places available, 609 were taken by non-EU candidates. In total, all 9,275 medical places across Spain have been filled.
