One of the most important services to set-up in a new place is medical and dental. My experience with medical and dental in Paris, France, has been fairly straightforward. Most of the medical system is part of the socialized medicine they have here in France. They are very proud of it and call it the best medical system in the world. My experience so far is that it is certainly acceptable and generally available. Since it’s socialized medicine, the out-of-pocket expenses, even for foreigners like me, are not that bad. So far, my out-of-pocket expenses range from 20 € to 100 € ($25 to $115) per visit including specialists. Since I used military medicine in the US, the out-of-pocket expenses here are quite similar for me. When I start paying social security taxes here in France and receive my medical card (the Carte Vitale), my out-of-pocket expenses supposedly go down even further.
My first experience was within a few weeks of arriving in Paris. My eye doctors in the US referred me to an eye specialist here in Paris. The doctor here is a colleague of my doctors in the US and even worked in Bethesda, Maryland, for many years in the past. They were very nice and thankfully spoke English which made the visit go very well. The eye specialist was good enough to refer me to an internal medicine doctor in the same hospital and even set-up the appointment for me.
The most amazing aspect of French medicine is the central reservation system for almost every type of medical or dental service called Doctolib (https://www.doctolib.fr). It’s a great website and phone app where you can set-up and change medical and dental appointments as well as keep your medical documents to send for each perspective appointment. I find it easy to use and a rather fascinating app. The app seems to have any type of medical or dental practice I can think of. Often appointments are not available for a number of weeks, but it’s very convenient.
So far, I have visited an eye specialist, an internal medical doctor, a general practitioner, and a dentist. Interestingly, many of the words for medical conditions and medicine are very similar between English and French which has helped a lot with figuring out how to communicate. In Doctolib, you can select which languages you want and the app will filter to those practitioners. There are many who speak English in Paris, so I have had little trouble communicating.
The practitioners I have met so far have been friendly and helpful. It has a very similar feel to the military medical system in the US, so it seems familiar to me. I especially like the Doctolib app to organize appointments and medical documents.
Also, the doctors here are not stingy with prescriptions. They converted all my US prescriptions to the European equivalents and gave me new prescriptions for everything. Most medicines are the same as in America or something close for the same medical effect. Since I am not in the French medical system, yet, I have to pay a little more for prescriptions, but only about 15 to 20 euros ($20 to $25) per prescription. These prices apparently will go down as well once I’m registered in the medical system.
Given my experiences, I am looking forward to participating in the French medical system. It looks like it will meet my needs with reasonable out-of-pocket expenses for my budget. This is certainly an attractive aspect of the French society.
Until we meet at the doctor’s office in Paris…
Talenton 