Rachelmcgillivray

Hello folks
I'm new to this forum. I've just arrived in Grenoble with my husband who works in electronics, and my 3 kids. I'm a GP back home in Scotland, and am quite happy not to work until we're fully settled here, kids happy and my French is better than basic! However, I would like to get back into GP type work at some point in the next 2 years. I understand they do recognise my qualifications, and that I would need to register with the equivalent of the general medical council, which would also involve a French language exam. As Grenoble has quite a large international population, and I'm also not sure my French will ever be so good that I'd trust myself to understand patients fully,my plan would be to try and either set up, or work in a practice treating English-speaking patients, as I've been told there is probably quite a large number of people who would look for that. Anyone had any experience of starting work in France as a doctor, or know anyone who may be able to help/give advice? Thanks!

dmu

Hi, I"ve read some of the link which I posted in answer to your earlier thread.
The French equivalent of the General Medical Council is the Ordre des Médecins and, as you know, you must first get registered with them.
It seems from the section "Autorisations Ministérielles d'Exercice" in the link, that you may be allowed to practise in France via the Ministère de la Santé, after the decision of a Commission, but it's doubtful that you would be able to set up a Cabinet as a "Libérale" exclusively for non-French patients ("discrimination"). On the other hand, once you've passed the French exam., you should be able to cope with treating French patients, too....
Others will come along with more specific advice, as I'm a lay-person in your field. I can only point you in the direction of the Ordre des Médecins for official info as per the link!

Rachelmcgillivray

Thank you! I obviously must have posted a couple yrs back when we first started thinking about a move, and forgot! I'll look at that link now thanks Again!

audio

Hello,
I cannot help with any qualification advice but I am sure a British doctor would be in great demand.
Even for those with a reasonable understanding of French would prefer to discuss the more ‘involved’ medical problems in their mother tongue I would think.
Good luck.

EuroTrash

A random thought that struck me is that you'd need to find out exactly how the French state healthcare system works. My doctor is very knowledgable about what the state covers and what it doesn't, and how much will be reimbursed. I'm sure cost is a big consideration for a lot of French patients when it comes to planning their treatment, because they need to know what would be affordable for them and what isn't and they expect their doctor to be able to help them with that. Especially expat patients who may not have a very good understanding of the system themselves and would be relying on you not to prescribe treatments or clinics that are beyond their means.

Maybe there is some kind of obligatory training, but it seems quite an important issue.

dmu

You"re right, I've no idea, but there must be some sort of training for that, and for all the administrative side of how a Doctor is paid, the Carte Vitale system, procedures for hospitalisation, etc.... Our MT (Médecin Traitant) complains of the time spent sorting out bureaucracy outside of consulting hours and the fact of now having a partner simply reduces her overheads, not the hassle.
Another point - French Doctors are qualified to prescribe French drugs and a foreign Doctor would probably have to prove to the Ordre des Médecins that they have perfect knowledge of French pharmacology.
Expats would indeed flock to an English Doctor, but if they need guidance for non-medical issues, the Doctor must know all the ropes to be able to advise them correctly.
@RachelMcGillivray - as you're already in Grenoble, try to make acquaintance with the local medical Fraternity, both G.P.s and hospital doctors. Once registered, it would probably be simpler, from an administrative point of view, to be employed in a Hospital where there would be many expat patients glad of your presence!

EuroTrash

The way it was explained to me by my doctor, who studied at Guy's Hospital and worked under the UK system for a while, GPs in France have a much freer hand than the NHS gives to UK GPs. No patient quotas, no per capita payments; you simply decide whether you are going to be conventionné or not and if you are you hook up to the central computer system, if you're not you set up your own system and set your own fees. Then you take on as many or as few patients as you want/can get, decide on your surgery hours, and off you go.

I'm sure he simplified it a lot for my benefit and there is more to it than that, but he certainly seemed to give the impression that he feels sorry for UK GPs working for the NHS.

Saying all that, the GP system in Scotland may be entirely different from that in England and Wales.

petitefrancaise

I had a British doctor for a while when I lived in Toulouse. His french was excellent since his mother had been French but he had been brought up, trained and worked most of his life in the UK. Go through ordre des medicins, you will have to prove your french is up to a certain level, your qualifications will most definitely be accepted but you made to have an equivalency done ( look at ENIC-NARIC France | CIEP). My Dr worked in a small cabinet of 3 drs in a town with a very large english speaking population so there was an obvious benefit to both him and the cabinet to host him. He was conventionne (charged what the secu said he could), earned 30% of his UK salary because of this. But he was happy. I liked him because he brought the "touchy feely" British dr approach along with the superb french medical system. He was also pretty open to discussing treatment options (ie disagreeing or proposing something else) which french drs generally aren't ok with. The downside was that he didn't have the knowledge of the local specialists which the other drs did. Patients in France get to choose which hospital and which specialist they want to go to and their GPs can guide them if asked but since most international arrivals also don't know how to choose a specialist it can slow the referral process somewhat if neither patient nor gp hasnt got this local knowledge.

As a word of caution... a British GP and his wife opened a practice near Toulouse which was private (non-conventionne) on the basis that there were english speaking, non french speaking patients with health problems that needed extra help. At the time their consultations were 100- 150 euros when the GP conventionne charged 23 euros. They quickly went out of business owing money all over the place.