2023-10-11 04:30:00
An inter-union of private doctors launched a call for a strike this Friday, October 13, in order to demand a revaluation of city medicine in particular. Who can patients turn to if needed?
They predict a “black Friday”. An inter-union of twelve unions of liberal doctors and students has launched a call for a strike for this Friday, October 13, in order to demand a “consequential” revaluation of city medicine and a modification of the Valletoux bill, considered too restrictive by doctors, among others.
“From Friday October 13, liberal medicine will stop to give a strong signal to the public authorities. Indisputably it is a Black Friday, and it will be renewed,” declared Philippe Cuq, president of the Bloc (union of surgeons ) and spokesperson for the inter-union, during a press conference this Tuesday.
“All consultation activities, technical acts, are deprogrammed,” he also said. According to a study by Drees, the studies department of the Ministry of Health, in 2021, 56% of practicing doctors have a liberal activity. What should people do who, despite this strike, need to consult a doctor outside the public system this Friday – and possibly following?
“Transfer to public hospital”
First of all, even if the inter-union anticipates that many private doctors will follow this strike, it is recommended to call your doctor to check if he or she will be able to keep your appointment. If he is on strike, the instruction from the inter-union is to “transfer to the public hospital”, explains to BFMTV.com the president of the Union of Liberal Doctors, Sophie Bauer.
“Our goal is precisely to show that we have difficulty doing without us,” underlines the surgeon.
Concretely, it will be recommended to “dial 15 if necessary”, where regulatory doctors can direct the patient, according to Soline Guillaumin, spokesperson for the Médecins pour demain collective. Note that the emergency services of many hospitals are also overwhelmed: “finding a doctor will be very complicated”, anticipates the general practitioner.
SOS Médecins also on strike?
Doctor Guillaumin also advises once morest going to see a pharmacist to compensate for the absence of your doctor: “a doctor makes a diagnosis, he palpates the patient, examines him and questions him. The pharmacist does not palpate, n “does not examine and has not been trained to make a diagnosis”, she explains.
“A runny nose, a sore throat, you might think it’s pharyngitis, but maybe it’s thyroiditis for example,” she says.
It may also not be easy to call SOS Médecins, some of whose practitioners might also go on strike, according to the inter-union. The exact terms of the strikes will be revealed this Thursday.
A strike to demand “strong political measures”
Future strikers want to make it clear that this mode of action is made necessary by the current situation. “Going on strike, for a doctor, is not trivial. A doctor is a vocation and going on strike is complicated,” Franck Devulder, president of the Confederation of French Medical Unions, told BFMTV.com.
“Simply, our fellow citizens must hear and understand that (…) if we want a health system that allows us all to have a doctor, strong political measures must be taken,” he adds. he.
“We contribute according to our means and we receive according to our network”
According to a Drees study from March 2021, the number of doctors is expected to decrease until 2024, a “reflection of the low numerus clausus of the 1990s and the cessations of activity of large generations”. These numbers should only return to their 2021 level by “2030”.
At the same time, the number of independent doctors tends to decline in favor of employees. “However, private doctors perform a greater number of consultation hours than salaried doctors” and “they constitute the main primary care offering, and an essential link in the patient care pathway,” explains vie- public.fr, an information site dependent on the Prime Minister’s services.
“What will happen from October 13 is what patients risk experiencing on an almost daily basis in the years to come,” also warns Soline Guillaumin.
“The principles of social security in France are ‘I contribute according to my means and I receive according to my needs’. But today, we contribute according to our means and we receive according to our network, our knowledge”, deplores his side Franck Devulder, gastroenterologist.
“We do this to improve our working conditions”
Conventional negotiations with Health Insurance were broken off last year, giving rise to an arbitration settlement, with an increase in the price of consultations of only 1.50 euros compared to the previous prices dating from 2017. “We need the means sufficient to support liberal medicine”, underlined Tuesday the representative of the inter-union, Philippe Cuq, adding that the new convention must “restore attractiveness to the profession” among young people, who are hesitant to settle down according to him.
“At some point, we have to show that we need resources for community medicine,” believes surgeon Sophie Bauer, president of the Union of Liberal Doctors.
“It’s not to be rich, it’s to be able to invest in our practices, we need certain equipment, to expand them,” she explains. “We are not doing this to increase our standard of living, we are doing this to improve our working conditions which allows us to better care for patients.”
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