Understaffed staff, degraded care supply, suffering caregivers, feeling of insecurity… Many hospitals are closing beds in psychiatric units for lack of caregivers and the number of vacant positions continues to grow.
With our correspondent in Nantes, Leo Helaine
Several dozen people gathered on Tuesday May 9 in front of the Nantes psychiatric hospital to denounce these deteriorating working conditions. Watchword : ” You need arms and beds. »
In the west of France, as in Nantes, the population is increasing. But not the offer of care in psychiatry. Beds are closing and the consequences are concrete. David Conset, nurse, is a union representative for the South. ” We absolutely cannot satisfy the requests for hospitalization and regularly, we send people homehe complains. Except that we end up with people who can be completely delusional, even who can want to commit suicide. And we’re going to take the most serious cases, hoping that nothing happens to those we’re going to send back. »
>> To read also: Psychiatry: how does the lack of resources affect the quality of care?
And when patients are taken care of, caregivers do not have the means to take care of them as they would like. ” For example, a patient who is not well, going out with him in the park helps to reduce the pressure. Today, there is no longer that possibility, he laments. So the patients remain tense in the units. The risk is that something serious will still happen at some point and we will say: the patients here are dangerous. No, they are not dangerous when properly cared for. And there, today, this is not the case. »
“ Marshall Plan »
A situation that leads to a lack of vocations. A vicious circle denounced by Morgan Le Faou, nurse in the psychiatric emergency room in Redon, between Nantes and Rennes: “ The hospital is in worse condition than before the Covid crisis. And so, given the degraded conditions, the working conditions and the conditions of care, there is no longer anyone who wants to do medicine or nursing, quite simply. »
To remedy this, many are calling for a “ marshall plan » for the hospital, higher salaries to gain in attractiveness.
A broader mobilization, at the regional level this time, is planned for May 23, in Nantes. All caregivers in the psychiatric sectors of the West are called upon to mobilize.
>> To read also: What consideration for mental health?