In Charente-Maritime, several hospitals spent the All Saints weekend in degraded mode. The reasons are many : since Friday October 28, the pediatric emergencies of Saintes were partially closed at night
, due to the lack of medical interns, on strike against a fourth year of internship. They will not reopen until Wednesday morning.
Monday evening, it is the Jonzac hospital which, in turn, had to work in degraded mode,
due to the absence of an emergency physician. The patients were invited to visit other hospitals in the region, including that of Rochefort, which did not withstand the shock, and ended up in turn restricting its emergencies to the most serious cases. In Rochefort as in Saintes, services should resume normally this Wednesday morning, 9 a.m.
Twenty patients treated in the wrong department
All it took was a four-day weekend, during which there were fewer doctors, for it to crack. “Since Monday morning, the hospitalization capacities of the Rochefort hospital have been totally saturatedwith releases of beds that are done in dribs and drabs”, explains Dominique Tourret, the head of emergencies at the Rochefort hospital.
“We have a total of about twenty patients who would justify a hospitalization room in a medical or surgical department. However, they are taken care of in the emergency room”, explains the doctor. Patients treated in the wrong department, due to lack of space, this is not without consequence on the quality of carerecognizes Pierre Thépot, general manager of the Groupe Hospitalier Littoral Atlantique, which manages the hospitals of Rochefort and La Rochelle.
Patients less well followed
We have patients who have a medical pathology and who are going to be housed in a surgery department. And the risk is that these patients are less well followed since they are not taken care of in a medical service.
Pierre Thépot, CEO of the Littoral Atlantique Hospital Group.
A new partial closure at Christmas?
A milestone has therefore been reached. The Rochefort hospital had never had to operate in degraded mode. And that’s just the beginning, “We drink the cup” warns the head of emergencies, Dominique Tourret. He says he fears that this All Saints weekend will only be a rehearsal “what awaits us for the holiday season”. The management wants to be more reassuring. The director general assures that he does not envisage new partial closures at the Rochefort hospital, without however excluding it completely.
Chronic lack of caregivers at Rochefort hospital
Hospitals can no longer convince doctors to come and work in the public. “They go away one by one” is alarmed the head of the Emergency Department of Rochefort.
“We have an anesthesia problem in Rochefort since we have six anesthesiologists leaving in six months”, explains Dominique Tourret. “We don’t know if we will be able to maintain anesthesia care in Rochefort”. The doctor also points to difficulties on the side of acute-geriatric medicine, which is losing two of its three practitioners. “They throw in the towel and go elsewhere. They leave. Just like a doctor in general medicine, who also wants to get some fresh air. Because he can’t take it anymore“, explains Dominique Tourret.
Doctor Tourret also mentions the case of a cardiology doctor who is about to leave. “I am naturally optimistic. As a leader, I can’t afford to be demoralizing__”, wants to believe the doctor. But it is clear that the doctors who have left the ship are younger and younger. “They are under 40 and don’t see themselves spending their lives in hospital. It’s getting too complicated”, concludes the head of the Emergencies.