The Limited Times

Now you can see non-English news...

"Leave free beds for cancer": the anger of patients with unscheduled operations

2022-01-06T07:37:47.158Z


TESTIMONIALS - Across France, operations are being deprogrammed, leaving many patients in the dark. Today, Titouan is celebrating his 28th birthday, and to his great surprise, with his family. If the young boy is not unhappy to be able to spend it in the company of his relatives, this day had to unfold in a completely different way. Titouan was due to undergo an operation on January 6, 2022. But, unsurprisingly, when the white plan had just been activated in his hospital in Strasbourg, he receiv


Today, Titouan is celebrating his 28th birthday, and to his great surprise, with his family. If the young boy is not unhappy to be able to spend it in the company of his relatives, this day had to unfold in a completely different way. Titouan was due to undergo an operation on January 6, 2022. But, unsurprisingly, when the white plan had just been activated in his hospital in Strasbourg, he received a call last week canceling his operation. Disappointed, the young man, quadriplegic for eight years and suffering from recurrent urinary tract infection, impatiently awaited the installation of a prostate stent. A surgical intervention that he qualifies as "

non-urgent, but still urgent

", which will have to be rescheduled.

Read alsoCovid-19: are people in intensive care "essentially unvaccinated"?

Since mid-December, many regions have activated the white plan in their hospitals, an emergency device allowing the mobilization of additional staff to deal with the influx of Covid-19 cases in this case. Patients who had to undergo a surgical or medical activity then see their operations be deprogrammed for various reasons: either by anticipation at the request of the Regional Health Agency (ARS), or by lack of health personnel or available resuscitation beds. Titouan's operation was deprogrammed at the request of his ARS. Currently, in the Grand Est department, 90.5% of resuscitation beds are occupied by patients sick with Covid-19, according to information from Covid-Tracker. A finding which then provokes anger in the young man,who blames the non-vaccinated people who, for him, are partly the cause of the cancellations.

The basis is not the saturation of the Covid but the lack of medical personnel "

Ludivine, 41, from Ain.

Hundreds of kilometers away, Ludivine, mother of three, is also angry. While she was also to undergo a total hysterectomy - removal of the uterus - an operation that she describes as a "

last-ditch operation

", which was finally to relieve her of her severe pain related to her endometriosis, she has received a call from his hospital in Ain last week, deprogramming his intervention at the request of the ARS. “

Everything had been planned since September: I had prepared myself psychologically, I had done all the possible analyzes, I had taken a month off after the operation, and someone had been hired to replace me. . And a few days before the operation, it stops like this

She breathes, with great perceptible disappointment.

However, if she is angry, she does not especially want to draw a parallel with the patients of the Covid who "

would saturate the hospitals

".

For her, this is not the whole truth: “

With the cancellations, we imagine that there are a lot of Covid people in intensive care.

But there are the medical staff who are lacking, those who are in burnout, or case of contact, or those who have the Covid-19.

The basis is not the saturation of the Covid but the lack of medical personnel,

”she storms.

A finding supported by Doctor Alice Desbiolles in an interview with

Le Figaro

, who affirms that the real problem in the hospital is structural: "

The hospital is undersized and unattractive for caregivers, in terms of salaries, working conditions, loss of meaning for its profession. However, beds available at the AP-HP are not open due to the departure of caregivers

, ”she said. "

In any case, the reality is that today, if we do not have the Covid, we are not a priority

," adds Ludivine.

Indeed, many hospitals deprogram operations at the request of the ARS, in advance. But others do it because they just don't have a choice. This is currently the case for Marseille hospitals, which are currently experiencing a Covid-19 saturation of 112%. Magalie, suffering from skin cancer, was due to undergo surgery on January 5, 2022, which is yesterday. Unlike Titouan and Ludivine, Magalie had to undergo an operation described as "

urgent

", under general anesthesia, to remove cysts linked to her cancer. However, his intervention was also deprogrammed: "

Last week, the hospital left me a message confirming the cancellation of my operation, without giving me a new date.

I have since tried to reach them on the phone 18 times to be exact, and sent an email.

I have no answer today

”.

You want to keep your freedom not to get vaccinated, so keep your freedom not to go to intensive care, and leave beds free for cancer

Magalie, 45, from Marseille.

His operation was deprogrammed because the hospital went on alert 5 of the white plan. With this level, only vital operations are maintained. "

They explained to me that once operated, if I had to go to intensive care, there would be neither bed nor intensive care physician available

," she continues. His operation is then considered "

non-vital

". "

But she could become so in six months if cancer develops

," she warns. And this time, it is not a problem only linked to a structural crisis: 90% of intensive care beds are occupied by unvaccinated people, 500 doctors from the AP-HM said on Monday in an article published on France Bleu, this Monday.

For Magalie, who does not define herself as "

pro-vax

", on the contrary, it is the last straw. While she has undergone all of her operations in local anesthesia for the past two years, leaving traumatic images in her head, it turns out that due to lack of available personnel, this time around, the local operation was not possible. Not being able to have an operation is “

completely unfair

”: “

The vaccine is a collective duty, it is no longer one's own right to individual freedom. You want to keep your freedom not to be vaccinated, so keep your freedom not to go to intensive care, and leave beds free for cancer, so that these people can have an operation. You have to go to the end of your reasoning, be logical and pragmatic

», Then launches the 40-year-old.

A question that is currently causing heated debate within learned society. Indeed, at the beginning of the week, Doctor André Grimaldi, created the controversy by suggesting that "it

would be good to systematically advise any adult person refusing to be vaccinated to write advance directives to say whether or not they wish to be vaccinated. resuscitated in the event of a severe form of Covid ”

. A question already asked in a column signed by 15 doctors in the newspaper

Le Monde

, published at the end of December. Asked about Europe 1, Dr Alice Desbiolles affirms to find "

very good

" the fact that one "

recommends to any person to make these advance directives, to know whether or not a person would like to be resuscitated in the event of an accident.

".

However, she adds that "

it is not a question of vaccination status

".

Source: lefigaro

All news articles on 2022-01-06

You may like

Life/Entertain 2024-02-10T06:24:13.868Z
Life/Entertain 2024-03-26T07:44:14.968Z

Trends 24h

News/Politics 2024-03-28T06:04:53.137Z

Latest

© Communities 2019 - Privacy

The information on this site is from external sources that are not under our control.
The inclusion of any links does not necessarily imply a recommendation or endorse the views expressed within them.