Unpaid trainee doctors: green light for compensation

The Court of Cassation (by Order No. 22989/2026) has handed down a ruling set to have far-reaching implications, as it affects a very large number of former postgraduate medical trainees. It has clarified that even doctors who began their postgraduate medical training before 1982 are entitled to compensation for the loss of remuneration provided for under European directives, which is now regularly paid to postgraduate trainees.

The case stems from Italia’s delay in transposing the EU directives requiring Member States to ensure that doctors undergoing specialist training receive adequate remuneration. For years, many doctors undertook their specialist training without receiving any remuneration and subsequently sought compensation from the State for the loss they had suffered.

The ruling by the Court of Cassation highlights a fundamental point: it is not merely the year of enrolment at the postgraduate medical school that counts. If the course was still in progress on 1 January 1983 – the deadline by which the European requirement had to be met – the doctor is entitled to compensation for the period following that date and up to the end of their training.

The Supreme Court also criticises the decision of the Court of Appeal, which, in the case of certain appellants, had calculated the compensation on the basis of a course duration longer than the actual duration, and has therefore ordered a fresh assessment of the amount of compensation.

The ruling by the Court in Piazza Cavour represents a crucial step in the long-running legal dispute concerning trainee doctors. This ruling effectively broadens the group of people who can claim their right to compensation, overturning an interpretation that had excluded many doctors simply because they had enrolled in a specialist training programme before 1982.