INTERVIEW. GPs who had quoted their consultation at 25 euros before the official increase are now being prosecuted. What MG France denounces.
About twenty general practitioners would be subject to a sanction from the Health Insurance for tariff disobedience. Several months before the revaluation of the price of their consultations, these doctors applied an increase of 2 euros.
Already in May, 4 doctors from Romillé (Ille-et-Vilaine) received a 4-month suspension of their social contributions for having charged the consultation at 25 euros, almost a year in advance. They appealed.
However, this sanction is not a surprise for these general practitioners since the Health Insurance had warned that it would not let anything go. But for MG France, one of the main unions to support them, an amnesty should have been granted because the general practitioners only defended themselves and tried to obtain better remuneration. Dr Claude Leicher, president of MG France, even adds that without this sling, general practitioners would never have obtained this upgrading. The standoff between Health Insurance and the unions continues.
You challenged the Minister of Health, Agnès Buzyn, what are you waiting for?
Dr Claude Leicher: We do not expect anything in particular from the Minister because the management of the agreement is between the Health Insurance and the signatory unions. We only warned Agnès Buzyn and her team that they were going to inherit a pricing conflict that was deemed to be over since the implementation of the 25-euro consultation on the 1st.er May 2017. This affair risks undermining the climate of confidence that the Minister wishes to establish.
We are simply telling him that these doctors have defended themselves, have asserted their rights. And it is probably thanks to them that the general practitioners obtained a consultation at 25 euros and not 24. Their determination made us stand up to the health insurance.
Claude Leicher, president of MG France
Still, the sanctions had been announced …
Dr Claude Leicher: Certainly, but the term tariff disobedience is not appropriate. Because we used a conventional method called the DE (device provided for by article 42.1 of the 2011 agreement, editor’s note) which authorizes an exceptional fee overrun depending on our working conditions. (1)
So Medicare considers that the use of this conventional device has been excessive. But I say it very clearly: if the Health Insurance wants to prohibit the use of regulatory provisions, that will not work. And if we must once again trigger the tariff dispute during the next discussions, MG France will do so, because we are determined that general practitioners are treated like other specialties.
Has the pressure intensified since the arrival of the new government?
Dr Claude Leicher: Procedures that we thought were over are continuing, such as that in Seine-Maritime, while others are starting. A procedure is initiated against 20 general practitioners in Paris and another would concern 4 doctors in Ain. So, all of a sudden, we see an increase in the number of physicians concerned when we could have dropped all this since the 1er may.
I would remind you, moreover, that these overruns represent only 8% of the value of the act and that they are exceptional and not systematic. While at the same time in sector 2, doctors practice much higher exceedances of the order of 300%.
We have the feeling that sector 1 is the preferred target for health insurance. Meanwhile, Sector 2 is living its life quietly.
(1) Doctors can apply this provision in “the event of exceptional circumstances of time or place due to a particular requirement of the patient unrelated to a medical reason”.
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