Up to half of the medical buses will be funded by the state. According to a plan presented this Thursday by Agnès Firmin Le Bodo, Minister Delegate for Territorial Planning and Health Professions, it will finance “from 30 to 50%” of the hundred of these itinerant medical practices that it intends to end up on the roads. from France,
The medicobuses, which cost between 100,000 and 400,000 euros depending on the model, are part of government efforts to combat medical desertification, one of the main current concerns of the French according to opinion polls.
The goal of 100 medical buses by the end of 2024 had been announced by Élisabeth Borne in mid-June, in a set of measures aimed at the return of public services in rural areas.
A dozen existing medical buses
In total, adding all the financiers, the deployment of a hundred health buses with at least one general practitioner on board will cost 20 million euros, according to figures provided on Friday by the minister’s office.
Today, there are already a dozen medicobuses, and eight are planned, in departments such as Orne, Manche, Lozère or in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur region.
The government wants around 30 new buses to be rolled out by the first quarter of 2024, with the effort ramping up thereafter to reach 70 by the end of 2024.
The ministry provides few details about the origin of the doctors who will board these medicobuses. “But only structures made up of local health professionals will be able to respond to the call for projects”, he underlined.
Aid for hiring medical assistants
The measures against medical desertification detailed this Thursday also include additional impulses for the development of medical assistants, who can relieve doctors of administrative tasks and reception of patients, and thus free up consultation time.
The President of the Republic announced in January a goal of 10,000 medical assistants by the end of 2024, compared to the current around 4,000.
The health insurance, the regional health agencies and Pôle emploi will launch communication actions to make the profession better known to doctors and the public who can perform these jobs, and thus speed up recruitment.
The health insurance already provides very important aid for doctors who hire medical assistants, up to 36,000 euros the first year of hiring, and 21,000 euros per year from the third year.
“Paintings” for a deputy from LR
Following the ministry’s announcements, the deputy for Isère and the cardiologist Yannick Neuder (LR) criticized in a press release “patches that do not question the structural failures of the health system”.
Yannick Neuder proposes for his part to make access to medical studies more open, introducing an exam in the first year instead of a competition, and facilitating access for paramedics to these studies.
It also proposes maximizing the creation of unscheduled care centers, which can alleviate hospital emergencies, and developing access to telemedicine.
Source: BFM TV
