This is France as I see it… It’s not meant to be an official guide and it’s only my opinion on some of the things that make France “France” for me.
A is for Assurance Maladie
Assurance Maladie literally means illness insurance and is essential here.
France has an excellent healthcare cover so long as you are employed, retired, on benefits or contribute as a self employed person. I’m sure there are some exceptions to that like for housewives etc but knowing France maybe they’re not covered?
As an employee or self employed person you contribute heavily into the black hole which is the “secu”. Why a black hole? Well, the healthcare system has tremendous debt and on top of your contributions anyone earning income from assets also pays a further tax to help remedy the black hole. Eversince I have lived in France the black hole has existed and somehow it just keeps getting bigger.
Maybe one of the reasons is the huge number of pills the French pop for the slightest ailment. Go to the Doctors with a common cold and you’ll come out with a prescription a page long for various medicines (probably including parecetmol, saline water etc). Most of these remedies will be paid for by the state medical cover, the majority will be reimbursed to you at 70%. Cost for a cold? 23 Euros for a Doctors appointment plus at least 15 Euros in medication!
I’m digressing. Despite the unfortunate circumstances that occurred around the birth of Baby Piglet, I do appreciate the French healthcare system. You have access to top Doctors as soon as you can convince the secretary to give you an appointment and emergency care is excellent (depending on where you go obviously).
When I had uveitis at the end of 2011, the total bill for my medical care came in at over 6000 Euros. This didn’t include the taxi I took every day to and from the hospital (100 Euros each way) or the laser eye surgery I had afterwards (not sure how much that cost). Thankfully because my illness is recognised by the state as being a long term affection I didn’t have to pay a penny. Not even for the taxi.
Suddenly all those heavy contributions seem well worth it. I cannot think of a better country in which to be ill, so long as you have cover of course. I am grateful for the French medical system and in awe that it’s still running as it is despite the incredible waste of funds.
I don’t know how it keeps going either, but I’m jolly glad it does!
Me too and boy do I use it! Cannot even imagine going through what I’ve been through in the UK…
As an American I appreciate the health care system here as if it were a hand of god. I went several years with no coverage in the US. If I’d ever get hurt I’d pray it was in my car because I had at least car insurance.
Since moving here I’ve had two major surgeries and another one on the way. I’ve had several ambulance rides and taxi’s too because I don’t have a car. I think in all of those bills the small amount I had to pay was still minuscule compared to one visit to a doctor in the US.
Technically I’ve never worked in France either. But I am married to a Frenchman who works in the school system so we have a mutuelle as well.
Oh wow, I cannot even imagine living in a place where you hope to get ill in a car because of insurance. What a stress!
Sorry you had to have surgery but at least it was in France, that was very fortunate for you.
Mutuelles are great things, I have one too and basically pay next to nothing for my glasses. I think they may kick me off soon!
I pay everything out of pocket here and then get reimbursed by our US medical insurance, it’s a pain, but what we have to do. I worry about having to pay for a large medical bill upfront and the costs, but I know it would be double or triple the price in the states.
A pain yes, but at least you get reimbursed! Don’t worry too much about large medical bills, my health cover once lapsed, vanished totally off the system and I didn’t have a carte vitale or anything anymore (I was changing between self employed and employed) and I had a few major expenses (MRI and CAT scans). They didn’t make me pay anything, they gave me the bill and said I could pay once I’d been reimbursed. I don’t think you’ll ever be denied treatment if you can’t pay upfront. Not in a hospital anyway.
I’m with you Piglet…I don’t know how it exists but I’m thankful for it. I am a resident but without the right to work, so I pay into the system. It’s inexpensive and actually one of the reasons I stay here. I simply can’t afford health insurance or health care in the U.S. You’re right about the number of prescriptions offered by the docs. My medicine cabinet is bursting with all sorts of pills and potions and I’m a very healthy person. If I had any serious maladies I’d have to buy a new, larger cabinet!
I keep my meds in suitcases!
It must be tough for you knowing that you have to pay into the system but not being able to work if you wish… I’m not sure I would be able to cope with that type of restriction but at least you benefit from the healthcare meanwhile
This is one more reason to love France. I’ve only visited, but I feel comfortable there whenever I do, that should illness befall me, I could get good care. They believe it is a human right. Imagine that! Love this post and the concept of a-z of France. Looking forward to more.
Thanks for your positive comments. Not all healthcare in France is great, there are plenty of incompetent docs like anywhere, but the overall cover the system provides is excellent. I just hope they work out a way to keep it going…
When we moved to France, foreigners, even if EU, were not permitted to join the system, so we took private health insurance – not BUPA!
It paid 100 % for everything and were glad of that over the years of treatments for Mr. Fly that cost about the same as a small car!
When EU bods were allowed to join, we thought we’d check how much we would be paying before dumping the private cover.
Our income varies from year to year and we could get no definite answer, no sight of any scale of payments, from the CPAM or from anyone else.
So we struck with the private health cover.
It’s the disjointed nature of the service that makes for black holes….why should a hospital,rake in money by keeping patients for one extra overnight stay at the end of treatment – monies paid by the Secu in the same system!
Good heavens Fly, how much did the BUPA insurance cost? I’ve always been on the French system here so know no different but I agree that it is really annoying (and worrying) that no one can ever give you a price for getting cover.
I am glad that the French health system has looked after you so well (ignoring the shambles of Baby Piglet’s arrival). But just one thing – when you listed the goodies the doctor will prescribe, you forgot to mention the regulation suppositories.
OMG! I did didn’t I? No idea how I forgot them especially as they are the medication delivery method of choice by the Docs for poor baby piglet…
I was reading another blog and it seems Turkey might be better.
Better in providing healthcare or better in managing their healthcare finances?
Our health insurance in Argentina is surprisingly good. It costs about the same as the insurance we had in the US and we get a huge amount more for the money. I have seen the top doctors in skin cancer, had surgery ( done by the head of heart surgery) and when I had a weird little pain, they just sent me downstairs to the lady who immediately did a sonogram … I got all of my results immediately. I am fine. colic. who knew ~
In the US there is such a huge waste of money throughout the health care systems and the doctors and hospitals are guilty of terrible greed and waste.
I would never have recognised it if I had not had close and personal views of what happens in another country.. luckily for us, we were here in Buenos Aires when it happened.
When the companies stop taking so much money for themselves, then things will start to work out better for the people.
rant over
Here here! 100% agree with you Candice! Thank goodness you were treated so quickly and that the system there is so efficient. Being totally ignorant about anything Argentina related, I would not have had them down as being good health care providers, just goes to show doesn’t it? All these countries make the US and UK look like third world countries…
As an observer and frequent visitor to France with multiple members of my French family who are MDs, Nurses and one who owns a couple of pharmacies in Paris, there is an awful lot of waste in the system so no wonder there is a black hole which keeps getting bigger. One area where the French system should add is the number of nurses on hospital unit. I was shocked to find out how few nurses are assigned to work on pediatric units and the expectation that a parent will be there to help their child while they are in the hospital. One of cousins who is a nurse on a pediatric unit in an Aix-en-Provence hospital tells me they have one nurse on their unit for 20 patients which compares to having 1 nurse for 2 patients with the neonates where my daughter works in the US and no more than 1 nurse for 5 where my other daughter works on a pediatric unit.
You’ve got some good insight there Michel and I completely agree from my experiences. I am convinced that my terrible afterbirth experience was due to lack of nurses and midwives. They were so scare the poor things just didn’t have the time to do their jobs properly.
It is worrying however that a pediatric unit doesn’t have sufficient nurses and that parents are expected to provide care. As if it isn’t hard enough for the parents as it is? I can only try and imagine.
Coming here from America, I too appreciate the healthcare system. So far this time around we haven’t needed to use it, but on our last turn here several years back we did and didn’t have to pay a dime for care, even though one of those times was surgery for my daughter. I do have to pay heavily into the system each month. I hope that pays off someday! My own opinion about the black hole is that it keeps getting bigger due to those who use the system and never pay into it. For the people who have to pay into in, they are fewer than takers. That makes for a mess and debt. I do hope France wakes up and fixes that!
Ashley
I agree with you about people not paying into the system but the French could save a load of money by cutting out the waste. Things have improved though, now you have to go to your medecin traitant (chosen GP) to get a prescription to go and see a specialist, without which you are reimbursed less. I can remember a while back you could basically go and see whoever you wished when you wished without any specific prescription. I once made an appointment to see a stomatologue thinking it was someone who looked after the stomach when in fact it was a type of face surgeon (I never really did understand what he did).
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Hello! Long time no ‘see’
How are you?
Re the assurance malady, this sounds a lot like the German system. The English system (NHS) isn’t bad either, neither is the Swiss system. It’s pretty good everywhere in the more industrialised countries of Europe, I guess. Which doesn’t mean that people won’t complain and complain and complain.