Public hospitals are detecting “slight positive signs” in terms of recruitment, but need continued financial efforts in their favor, said Tuesday the French Hospital Federation (FHF), which brings together public hospitals and nursing homes.
Recruitment difficulties for health establishments increased sharply after the Covid crisis, sometimes forcing hospitals to close beds more or less temporarily.
There are slight positive signs in terms of recruitment in hospitals and nursing homes, after the efforts made in particular for the purchasing power of nursing staff, said Arnaud Robinet, president of the FHF and also mayor (Horizons) of Reims.
Still many vacancies
However, we must not relax the effort: we are in the middle of the ford and a lot remains to be done, he underlined during a press conference.
In June 2023, 4.98% of nursing positions were vacant in establishments dependent on the FHF, compared to 5.7% in April 2022. This rate remains very high in nursing homes (12.22%, compared to 13, however). 1% in April 2022).
This improvement should make it possible to better organize care and to have the right teams in the right place, but it would be premature to mention possible re-openings of beds, because there are still tensions and occasional closures due to lack of caregivers, said Zainab Riet, the general delegate of the FHF.
The financial situation of public hospitals and nursing homes also remains precarious, with a projected cumulative deficit of around one billion euros for the year 2022, i.e. almost doubling the structural deficit before the Covid crisis, which was of 5,600 million euros, according to the FHF.
The federation is therefore asking for increased public funding in the next Scu budget, which will be examined next fall.
While the government is seeking to tighten the budgetary screws by all means to meet the commitments made to the EU, the FHF is asking for a catch-up of 3 billion euros for 2023 for public hospitals (National spending objective hospital health insurance), and an additional increase of 4.9 billion euros for 2024.
The very positive salary measures announced by Elisabeth Borne last week will have to be financed to the nearest euro by the state, in particular to prevent hospitals from cutting back on their investments, indicated Arnaud Robinet.
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