“I have seen people arrive with acute clinical signs, with delays in diagnosis and treatment.” Dr Jean-Luc Philip, 71, is one of the doctors from the Alpes-Maritimes who took part in the Médecins solidaires adventure.
In March 2023, he spent a week at the Ajain care center in Creuse. “A mobile home with a waiting room, the secretaries’ office and then the doctor’s office”, remembers this practitioner, member of the council of the order in the Alpes-Maritimes, who took a “active retirement” and has two permanent contracts. One as coordinating physician for a territorial resource center in Nice, the second in a medicalized reception center for adults with autistic disorders in Levens.
“My wife and I arrived on Saturday. We were welcomed by the mayor of the village, who was very happy to have us. I had some time to coordinate with the doctor who was ahead of me. On Sunday, we had time to settle in and I started the consultations on Monday morning.”
“Ajain’s doctor has left. He has not been replaced, continues Dr. Philip. The village is 20-30km from Guéret. I saw people from Guéret coming for consultations. This shows that the needs are enormous. We often hear about a medical desert, but here we really see it. We can feel the tension that this represents for access to care, emergencies, the lack of prevention.”
“This organizational model is exemplary. We really do medicine.”
“The patients ranged from infants to children aged 6, 7, 8, with lots of vaccinations, viruses, winter illnesses. There were also active people. Here too, I was very surprised. Young people with symptoms that were not treated. I had a throat phlegmon, very serious dental abscesses. And elderly people with serious illnesses: diabetes, sleep apnea, respiratory failure that were not treated or not well treated.”
“The healthcare organization model of this collective is exemplary, so efficient, with very well-trained medical secretaries. We really do medicine because we are free from all the administrative side. I think that it will attract young people to areas like this. Our politicians have not yet managed to develop this model. I think that it will attract young people and that is what we must hope for.”
The Alpes-Maritimes Medical Council is organizing an information meeting on the Médecins solidaires scheme on Tuesday, July 2 at 6:30 p.m. at the Claude Pompidou Institute, 10, rue Molière, in Nice.
