Within the framework of the “Strategic Forum: Work and Professionals in the Health Sector | Governance, Well-being and Sustainability”, held during the 7th National Congress of the Order of Portuguese Psychologists, several professional orders, including the Order of Dental Medicine (OMD), represented by Miguel Pavão, committed to placing the health and well-being of those working in the sector among the priorities for governance, quality, and sustainability of healthcare organizations and systems.
The Coimbra Declaration 2026 emphasizes the need to go beyond recognizing the importance of mental health, focusing on creating conditions for its protection. This responsibility should translate into policies, governance models, organizational practices, and monitoring mechanisms that promote prevention and action.
The document establishes five central commitments: integrating professional health into governance; knowing, measuring, and monitoring working conditions and quality; preventing through work organization and transformation; developing healthy leadership and work cultures; and transforming evidence into responsibility and action.
Among the proposed changes is the regular assessment of psychosocial risks and working conditions, accompanied by action plans, goals, and result monitoring. The declaration further underlines that factors such as workload, autonomy, available resources, leadership, recognition, psychological safety, and work-life balance should be treated as determinants of professional health that organizations can and should act upon.
The document also addresses the profound transformations underway in the sector, including digitalization, Artificial Intelligence, and automation, advocating for their implementation with the participation of specialized professionals and the evaluation of their impacts on workload, skills, autonomy, health, and safety.
The declaration directs recommendations to the Government, governmental areas responsible for the health workforce, governance, planning, and regulation entities, organizations and their management bodies, leadership, professional Orders and organizations, academic and scientific institutions, and professionals themselves.
The promoting entities are the Order of Portuguese Psychologists, with the support of the Local Health Unit of Coimbra. Among the signatories are the Order of Social Workers, Order of Biologists, Order of Nurses, Order of Pharmacists, Order of Physiotherapists, Order of Physicians, Order of Dental Medicine, Order of Veterinarians, Order of Nutritionists, and the Order of Portuguese Psychologists.
