Would we take risks today, in France, by going to the emergency room? The saturation of services would be such that an emergency doctor gives an alarming answer to this question. In the establishment where he works, this whistleblower filmed for “Complément d’Enquête” images of his daily life which are not reassuring…
“I don’t want, just by keeping silent, to be an accomplice. Even if I have to lose my job, I can’t keep quiet anymore, it’s not possible.” Sébastien Harscoat is an emergency doctor at the CHRU in Strasbourg, where requests to shoot “Complément d’Enquête” were refused. Despite the risk of losing his job, he filmed his daily life for a month. Day after day, his images show a hospital on the verge of implosion, apocalyptic reception conditions.
In the yard, there are sometimes up to seven ambulances waiting for their passenger to be taken care of. Inside the hospital, major emergencies accumulate. Some patients remain confined to the emergency room for several days in a row. “We are in this situation, a bit of catastrophe, of war, continuously, alert the practitioner. Patients on the stretcher, who have been there for 48 hours, three days, four days… five days, it happens. The last one, he stayed on a stretcher for seven days.”
“A lot of times I see a patient, assess them quickly, say ‘See you later’. And when I close the door, I know that I’m actually lying to them. I don’t I’m not even sure I’ll be able to go see him again.”
Sébastien Harscoat, hospital practitioner in the emergency room of Strasbourg university hospitalsin “Further investigation”
Since the Covid crisis, the situation has continued to worsen, with the departure of eight doctors between SAMU and emergencies. In such conditions, how can patient safety be ensured? There The real question that must be asked, according to Sébastien Harscoat, is this: can you go to an emergency department today, in France, without taking any risks? And according to him, the answer is “no”, the risk would even be present permanently.
“There is no certainty that at some point you will come out unscathed,” he warns, saying he is unable to guarantee proper care. And this despite all the energy deployed by the staff, from the healthcare teams to the department heads. He claims to have alerted his management on numerous occasions to the seriousness of the situation.
Extract of “When emergencies no longer respond!“, a document to see in “Complementary investigation” on the 1st June 2023.
> Replays of France Télévisions news magazines are available on the Franceinfo website and its mobile application (iOS & Android), “Magazines” section.