With judgement no. 1753 of 16 April 2019, the employment judge of the Court of Lecce upheld the appeal of a general practitioner who argued that the monthly reduction of his salary ordered by his local health authority, after he prescribed oxygen cylinders over the limits set by the relevant guidelines for a single patient, was illegitimate. The defence of the general practitioner was that the case in question forced him to deviate from the guidelines, while the local health authority insisted on the need for a rigid interpretation of the guidelines. In its judgement upholding the appeal, the Court clarified that an over-rigorous interpretation of the meaning of the guidelines and of the effects of possible breaches of prescriptions or indication is detrimental with respect to the need to safeguard health as a fundamental right under art. 32 of the Italian Constitution, as it could place the medical practitioner in a difficult dilemma between his responsibility to his patients and the risk of salary deductions as a result of prescriptions he deems necessary in the particular case that are not compliant with the guidelines. The Court of Lecce concluded by stating that the medical practitioner must be afforded a degree of discretion and that personal liability can be found only in the event of wilful default or clear error.