ONLY 8.6 per cent of newly qualified doctors last year set up in independent practice, as opposed to working as replacement doctors or employees.
Doctors' professional body the Conseil de l'Ordre, which has just published its latest map of trends showing the spread of doctors around France, is concerned that so many of them, 66.8 per cent, chose to take salaries in hospitals or other large institutions, leading to shortages of accessible local specialists and GPs.
The problem is compounded by an unequal spread of doctors around France, leading to some rural areas becoming "medical deserts", plus the fact that that, according to the study, 70 per cent of working French doctors are aged 50 or more, so access to local doctors is expected to get worse as more retire.
All of the most southerly French regions (as well as the Rhone-Alpes) have plenty of doctors per 100,000 inhabitants, as do Alsace and the Ile-de-France. However the Auvergne, Limousin, Brittany, Nord-Pas-de-Calais, Lorraine and Franche-Comte have an average amount, while eight regions, including Normandy and Poitou-Charentes, are poorly served.
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