“It is the heart of the medical convention that the minister is preparing. This heart, as Emmanuel Macron defined it on Wednesday, consists in giving a doctor to the chronically ill who, settled in medical deserts, cannot find one. “They are 600,000,” assured the Head of State during his television interview on France 2 and TF 1. A figure below reality, even more alarming. 714,000 patients said to be in long-term illness (ALD) are in fact without a general practitioner, the Health Insurance tells us. They were 510,000 four years ago. More than 10% of them have not seen any doctor in town during the year.
“The urgency is there,” confirms Nathalie Delacotte, of the Association of Citizens Against Medical Deserts (ACCDM). At 54, this mother with fibromyalgia that exhausts her and hurts her joints took seven years to find her white coat. And had his first consultation… two days ago! “I no longer believed in it and it was finally the doctor of a friend of a friend who ended up agreeing to take on a new patient, she says. Without this word of mouth, I’d still be here looking. »
To go to consult, she had to travel the 25 km which separate Le Mans (Sarthe), where the practitioner practices, from her village of Lombron. “50 km round trip, with the price of gasoline, the weight of the disease… We are far from the time when I had my village doctor”, she breathes. So, inevitably, she wonders: will Emmanuel Macron be able to keep his promise and under what conditions? How many time and kilometers swallowed to cross a stethoscope? The roadmap is well and truly launched, assures us of the Health Insurance.
The first letters leave at the beginning of April
“Beginning of April”, i.e. in nine days, the Social Security will indeed send a first postal letter or e-mail to all ALD patients who have not declared a general practitioner. “This message will inform them of the launch of health insurance actions to support them in their search for a general practitioner. The persons concerned will also be informed of the fact that they can oppose the process. Clearly, no one is obliged to have a doctor.
But if we look in detail, the process becomes more complex and in fact concerns some 180,000 people, a quarter of ALD patients. Those who have seen a doctor three times in the year without the latter being declared as “theirs”. The social security will contact this same doctor to invite him to formalize the relationship. “Other actions will be taken,” she adds.
“These patients are the tree that hides the forest. 6 million French people do not have a general practitioner, ”recalls Nathalie, who carries the voice of angry patients on behalf of her association. Young parents who cannot find a pediatrician for their baby. Or older ones, like Nathalie who has just driven to Angers – an hour and a half by car from her home – her 35-year-old daughter, who had not found an ENT closer.
