"We're making do with bits of string": a single psychiatrist at Laval hospital, nurses helpless
Nurses and psychologists at their wit's end. In Laval, Mayenne, the psychiatry department of the city's hospital will have only one psychiatrist, compared to twelve three years ago. Two of them announced their departures last week.
"I've been working for eight years, and I've been in a state of loss for eight years. We're making do with little, we don't have the proper training," Samia, a psychiatric nurse at the hospital, confided to RMC with tears in her eyes. With her tight bun and white coat on, she suffers every day from the lack of psychiatrists in her department.
"I have to be a social worker, a doctor, a psychiatrist. I'm doing things that are completely outside my duties," laments Samia, a psychiatric nurse.
"We have patients, we haven't heard from them for I don't know how long. And we don't have time to call them, we don't have time to go see them, because we no longer have the staff," Samia insists.
By November, there will only be one full-time psychiatrist left in the department. This situation is untenable for Jeremy, also a nurse in the department: "Psychiatry without a psychiatrist is like surgery without a surgeon."
Management says it is "mobilized" to maintain the psychiatric program. It states that three doctors will come three days a week. Psychiatrists will come from Angers, more than an hour's drive from Laval. Starting November 2, these three Angers psychiatrists will provide a medical presence to ensure medical continuity and supervision of interns.
This first step is considered "insufficient" by the unions. Nurses fear poor care and patient suicide due to errors or lack of time. Force Ouvrière representatives sent a letter to the ARS and the office of the Minister of Health to raise awareness of the situation.
RMC
