Every day, they are at the bedside of the children.
4,148 white coats working in the largest pediatric wards are uniting to denounce an already more tenable situation when the winter epidemics have barely begun.
And that bronchiolitis is now installed on almost the entire territory.
Care deprogrammed for lack of beds, transfers outside the region of toddlers, young people hospitalized in adult services... Faced with this deleterious situation, doctors, professional unions, learned pediatric societies as well as 18 patient associations are appealing to the President of the Republic.
Here is their open letter to Emmanuel Macron that we publish exclusively.
The text of the forum
" Mr. President of the Republic,
After only 2 weeks of usual and predictable winter epidemics, pediatric intensive care units throughout France are saturated, hospital services are overflowing, so-called non-emergency care is postponed and more than 15 Parisian children have been transferred outside the region, in Reims, Rouen, Amiens, Orléans, when their medical situation was critical.
Mr. François Braun, Minister of Health, recently judged that we were used to these winter peaks and that these transfers are done without endangering the children.
We denounce here the glaring degradation of the care given to children which puts them in danger on a daily basis.
So we, pediatricians and pediatric caregivers, will hold on, as usual.
We will do our best to provide the best possible care for children: we will keep children on stretchers in the emergency room, hospitalize children in adult intensive care units who, out of solidarity, will try to do the best, reassure distraught parents to see their child transferred in a hospital several hundred kilometers away.
We will be with patients followed for chronic illness, we will hold a reassuring speech by explaining that the cancellation of the necessary examinations will have no consequence, that the 3rd postponement of spinal surgery scheduled to improve breathing and the quality of their child's life will be the last.
We will justify a premature discharge from hospital on a still fragile child to free up a precious place which will accommodate another child who has become more urgent and more serious.
We will apply the directives which ask us, for “safety” reasons, to limit the number of suicidal adolescents admitted to pediatrics, by sending them home to their despair and that of their parents.
We will call every day a family forced to manage an emergency situation at home themselves or to carry out the necessary care for their child on their own.
We will convince parents that carrying out planned hospitalization care in a hotel near the hospital will be risk-free.
In short, we will stand by the parents and children whom the healthcare system puts at risk.
And the winter will pass, we will not sleep, even in our sleep we will watch over them to the detriment of our health.
Some of us will leave, again, the disillusioned interns will leave the hospital as soon as their training is finished, the young nurses will change jobs, discouraged.
Other beds will close in indifference, the health of children will continue to deteriorate, insidiously, before our eyes but never appearing in the Excel spreadsheets that you consult.
Many reports in which we have collaborated, including that of Igas
(General Inspectorate of Social Affairs)
, were force of proposals for the public hospital, quickly buried during the Ségur de la santé.
It is urgent to be able to reopen beds in pediatric wards by stopping the flight of caregivers and recruiting passionate young people.
It is urgent to restore hope to those present and to attract new talents by giving meaning to our missions, by allowing us to refocus on our core business;
by better assessing the heaviness of the care that falls to us;
by adapting the ratios of patients per nurse/caregiver pair;
by reassessing salaries and working conditions, taking into account the level of study, responsibility and hardship, as in other European countries;
Mr President, pediatrics no longer seems to be a priority, yet these children are the future.
Current and past leaders have turned a blind eye to the abandonment of public hospitals and pediatric wards.
They are now responsible for the consequences on children's health.
»
Open letter signed between October 20 and 21, 2022 by 4,148 pediatric caregivers, including 18 patient associations.
Dr Mélodie AUBART, Neuropediatrician, Necker-Enfants Malades Hospital, Paris.
Pr Isabelle DESGUERRE, Neuropediatrician, Necker-Enfants Malades Hospital, Paris.
Dr Laurent DUPIC, Pediatrician, Smur Necker-Enfants Malades, Paris.
Dr Véronique HENTGEN, Pediatrician, André Mignot Hospital, Versailles.
Pr Jean-Luc JOUVE, Orthopedic Surgeon, La Timone Hospital, Marseille And President of the CME (Medical Coordination of Establishment of the CHU of Marseille).
Pr Christèle GRAS LE GUEN, Pediatrician, Nantes University Hospital And President of the SFP (French Society of Pediatrics).
Dr Andreas WERNER, Pediatrician, Villeneuve-lès-Avignon And President of the AFPA (French Association of Ambulatory Pediatrics).
Pr Nadia BAHI-BUISSON, Pediatric Neurologist, Necker-Enfants Malades Hospital, Paris And President of the CNU of Pediatrics (National Council of Universities of Paris).
Dr Mahmoud RIFAI,
Intern and President of the Association of Pediatric Juniors, Paris.
Pr Robert COHEN, Pediatrician, Saint-Maur-des-Fossés, And President of the CNPP (National Professional Council of Pediatrics), President of the GPIP (Group of Pediatric Infectious Pathology).
Pr Fabrice MICHEL, Pediatric Anesthesiologist-Resuscitator, La Timone, Marseille And Secretary of the GFRUP (Francophone Pediatric Resuscitation and Emergency Group).
Dr Isabelle MELKI, Pediatrician Rheumatologist, Robert Debré Hospital, Paris And President of SOFREMIP (Francophone Society of Rheumatology and Inflammatory Diseases in Pediatrics).
Pr Despina MOUSHOUS, Pediatric Immunologist, Necker-Enfants Malades Hospital, Paris And President of the SHIP (French Society of Pediatric Hematology and Immunology).
Pr Cyril SCHWEITZER, Pediatrician,
Nancy CHRU And President of the SP2A (Pediatric Society of Pneumology and Allergology).
Dr Emmanuel CIXOUS, Pediatrician, Seclin, And President of SNPEH (National Union of Pediatricians in Hospital Establishments).
Pr Matthieu VINCHON, Pediatric Neurosurgeon, Woman Mother Child Hospital, Lyon And Vice-President of the SFNP (French Society of Pediatric Neurosurgery).
Dr Béatrice PELLEGRINO, Pediatrician, Mantes-la-Jolie Hospital And President of the College of Pediatricians of the Ile de France General Hospitals.
Dr Brigitte VIREY, Pediatrician, Dijon, And President of the National Syndicate of French Pediatricians…
Lyon And Vice-President of the SFNP (French Society of Pediatric Neurosurgery).
Dr Béatrice PELLEGRINO, Pediatrician, Mantes-la-Jolie Hospital And President of the College of Pediatricians of the Ile de France General Hospitals.
Dr Brigitte VIREY, Pediatrician, Dijon, And President of the National Syndicate of French Pediatricians…
Lyon And Vice-President of the SFNP (French Society of Pediatric Neurosurgery).
Dr Béatrice PELLEGRINO, Pediatrician, Mantes-la-Jolie Hospital And President of the College of Pediatricians of the Ile de France General Hospitals.
Dr Brigitte VIREY, Pediatrician, Dijon, And President of the National Syndicate of French Pediatricians…
As well as Patient Associations: SOOTHE S&C - SPARADRAP - AFFMF - Childhood, Adolescence Diabetes - HTaPPFrance Living without Thyroid - Help to Help - 2AF Workshop - Help for Young Diabetics - entRED Paris Association, Childhood Diabetes Network - IRIS - Kourir - France Vascularities French Association of Angelman Syndrome - Ariane-Handicap Association Understanding Cerebellar Syndromes - AMSN - Tintamarre
Full list of signatories to be found at this address