Health, wealth & happiness

We have had constant need of the health services since we came to France, but at no time more than over the past two months. Mary's undiagnosed heart problems led to a mini-stroke, the pompiers came and in no time she was in hospital in Montpellier. Later in the heart unit her narrowed artery was corrected by a 'stent' and now she has blood-thinning drugs and several more. All simply paid for by our carte vitale and the complementary insurance we took out as soon as we arrived. We were especially lucky being near one of the leading centres for heart treatment in Europe, but the care was impressive in any case.

Emergency services tend to be pretty good in England too, but the big difference we notice is in the regularity and thoroughness of GP visits. The necessity of a designated GP or médecin traitant here is fairly recent - in the old days, people went straight to specialists. The GP was supposed to act as a gatekeeper saving specialists' time, but in addition for me it makes good sense especially if you don't know quite what is wrong with you - how do I know whether to go to the cardiologue or the gastroentérologue.

Many GPs here (like ours) offer supplementary services - homoeopathy, acupuncture for example. None of these ever seem to have done me much good, but the regular checkups and tests are very reassuring especially after a sudden emergency like Mary's - a partner like me can only really watch and wait and feel anxious - unexplained pains suddenly seem more serious! In England I only really went to the doctor when there was something obviously wrong, prescriptions were renewed automatically and nobody ever suggested regular visits. I have an underactive thyroid for which I've had regular blood tests for years but that was all that was tested for.

Here I go to the doctor every three months, essential to renew my prescriptions, and I have annual blood tests. These are three pages long and handed to me the same day with abnormalities highlighted in bold print. Thus I discovered my excess cholesterol, now well-controlled by the statin Tahor. Our GP was recommended for his diagnostic skills, and he also put his finger on one of the causes of my throat nodules, which stopped me singing for nearly a year - acid reflux from the stomach, now also well-controlled with drugs, as is the pain from my arthritic knee.

You can see why the pharmacist is such an important part of French life! Of course, like other health services the French one is creaking under the strain of paying for our better health and longer life, and part of this is due to the drugs bill. But here we know all the time how much things cost, and while much is reimbursed, often we pay upfront for health services. The regular statements from the CPAM and the mutuelle make fascinating reading.

To get back to my regular and reassuring GP visits, in my heightened state of anxiety over my own health I had a conversation recently with a British friend who is undergoing treatment for prostate cancer. We talked about the difficulty of getting tests for PSA (prostate-specific antigen), an advance warning indicator (in the blood) of prostate problems. So I asked my doctor yesterday if he could arrange it for me and he pointed out that it is already part of the annual blood tests I have as a matter of routine. He also took my ECG (normal apparently) which I insert here just for the hell of it:

Finally, I'd thought the title of this post would be a quotation from a famous writer, but though many have used combinations of 'health, wealth and happiness' in their writings, and though it is now a catch-phrase and frequent title of books and websites, I can find no obvious source. Health and happiness are most important, but of course wealth helps, if only enough to pay for the mutuelle!