2023-11-17 12:59:17
“Health comes to the station. » With a play on words, the SNCF summarized on Friday November 17, in a press release, its solution to combat medical deserts and more broadly the insufficiency of the healthcare offer: the railway company is planning the installation, by 2028, 300 telemedicine spaces within stations.
Pending the development of dedicated premises with a surface area of 30 to 70 m2, boxes of 15 square meters or trucks equipped with telemedicine equipment will be installed in stations or on their forecourts. It is Loxamed, a subsidiary of the leading rental company of public works equipment in Europe, Loxam, which will be responsible for deploying the system, in partnership with the health innovation company Capitello Med.
“The nurse, armed arm of the doctor”
Patients will be welcomed by a state-certified nurse, who will carry out the administrative procedures, measure the constants (pulse, respiratory rate, fever, etc.) and put the person in touch, via video, with a doctor established in France, and if possible, nearby.
“It will be a real consultation, a first-level consultation, for non-urgent, non-scheduled care, and which does not require – at least not immediately – the expertise of a specialistspecifies Arnaud Molinié, the president of Loxamed.
“The nurse will be, in a way, the doctor’s armed wing. In the event of an otitis, for example, he can insert an otoscope equipped with a camera and connected to the machine into the ear canal. The practitioner will be able to follow and guide the examination. At the end of the consultation, he will be able to write a prescription, print it and give it to the patient,” continues the boss of this company which had already deployed around thirty screening boxes in large stations during the Covid pandemic.
Stations, the ultimate places of activity in the region
The choice of stations which will host the telemedicine spaces will be made in conjunction with the regional health authorities and local communities. “On the one hand, these will be areas with a very dense population but in which the provision of care remains insufficient, as is often the case in Seine-Saint-Denis. And on the other hand, sparsely populated territories which are sorely lacking in health services,” advances Arnaud Molinié.
Why stations? “Because they are generally centrally located and constitute, in many places, the last place of activity in the territory”, we respond at SNCF Gares et Connexions, the subsidiary of the railway company responsible for these infrastructures. Because, also, the investigations it carries out show that “users are looking for health services within the stations themselves”.
30% of French people live in a medical desert
The SNCF thus intends to develop the installation of pharmacies and offices or medical centers within stations, such as the one opened in 2020 in Paris, above the hall of Montparnasse station. “There are currently 23 across France”specifies SNCF Stations and connections. “Ten million people pass through stations every day and 90% of the population lives less than 10 km from a station”underlined Raphaël Poli, general retail director at Gares et Connexions, in order to justify the relevance of the system.
According to a senatorial report published in 2022, 30% of the French population lives in a medical desert. And 1.6 million people give up care each year for reasons including delays in appointments considered excessive.
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