After an agreement between the unions of liberal doctors and the Health Insurance, telemedicine settles in France from September 15. The consultations, which will be reimbursed, should make it possible to provide better access to care.
Consulting your doctor from home will soon be possible. Three unions of liberal doctors and Health Insurance have signed an agreement on teleconsultation and teleexpertise: on September 15, the service will be officially launched in France, according to a decree in Official newspaper published on August 10.
Protect health data
This service will be reserved for patients residing in France: they will be able to have a remote medical consultation and receive a prescription digitally, all of which will cost them the same price as a consultation in an office: 25 euros with a general practitioner and 30 euros with a specialist.
Systems ensuring data protection will be put in place through dedicated platforms. Doctors will be able to receive aid to equip themselves with suitable equipment, which will amount to a maximum of 525 euros. For the patient, it will be necessary to be equipped with a tablet or a computer with a webcam. This should allow people who do not have access to care for various reasons (medical desert, life in nursing home, etc.) to improve their medical follow-up.
Tele-expertise reserved for certain cases
The decree at Official newspaper also sets the framework of the remote expert: it is defined by “the expertise requested by a doctor called ‘requester’ and given by a doctor called ‘doctor required’ because of his training or his particular competence, on the basis of information or medical elements related to the care of a patient, and this, outside the presence of the latter”. It will initially be reserved for patients suffering from long-term illnesses, rare diseases, patients who live in under-dense areas (where there are few doctors) and who have no attending physician, those who live in Ephad or who are incarcerated.
The digital shift
????????Hospitals, clinics, health centers, PMI… more than 1,000 health establishments, all over France, are now open to making appointments online on Doctolib! pic.twitter.com/yZIQC5GLHF
— Doctolib (@doctolib) April 3, 2018
Several initiatives have been launched in recent years to improve access to care through digital technology. Doctolib, for example, has completely transformed the way of making an appointment with a healthcare professional. 55,000 doctors are now registered on this site and every month nearly 20 million patients visit the website to make an appointment.
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