NOTWe, psychiatrists practicing psychiatry in public service in Paris and the inner suburbs, would like to make our concern public. We are witnessing the suffocation of a profession that is essential to our specialty, that of psychiatric nurses, and we are seeing that the psychiatric hospital is the first victim.
This much-demanded hospital is obviously not a priority for our administration, even though its solidity would allow us to find serenity throughout the healthcare system. However, the lack of staff seriously compromises the reception conditions for patients and the continuity of care, with a major risk of deterioration in the mental health of the population if we fail to meet needs.
A significant increase in the salaries of professionals working in hospitalization, particularly nurses, seems essential to us in order to meet these challenges. To support, take care of, welcome all people affected by a psychological disorder, our first tool is in fact the relationship, prior to any treatment, whether this is done in the hospital or on an outpatient basis.
Escape of staff
This implies that we are present, in number and available. This is absolutely not the case today: in many hospital departments, a growing number of nursing positions are vacant; many services have had to close beds due to lack of professionals. This situation degrades reception capacities, the quality of care and leads to arduous work which encourages staff to flee.
There are no signs to predict spontaneous improvement. The lack of attractiveness of inpatient nursing positions is glaring: in current conditions, this work is very harsh, sometimes with situations of violence. But, above all, the lack of availability hinders relational care and increases tensions with people in a state of psychological crisis. It is indeed the possibility of treatment that is under attack.
Investing in psychiatric hospitals is an absolute necessity to continue the development of a quality outpatient offer, which must be the pillar of care projects. Any caregiver involved with a patient in a community home care team, for example, must be able to count on another team which would be a recourse in the event of failure and which will have all the human and material resources to accommodate a patient who ‘he would not have succeeded in appeasing.
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