Employed doctors in the countryside: since 2019, the Centre-Val de Loire region, the area with the lowest density of general practitioners in France, has employed 69 healthcare professionals to fill the gap, a major challenge in the face of recruitment difficulties.
In Patay, a small village in the Beauce region of France with 2,190 inhabitants located 30 kilometers from Orléans, the arrival of new caregivers has been welcomed as a "relief," rejoices one of the patients, Jacqueline Guignard. For several years, this 76-year-old retiree had not had a primary care physician.
In this health center, one of twenty that welcomes the 69 professionals employed by the region, appointments are coming thick and fast and an entire town is regaining its autonomy, according to Ms. Guignard.
Three doctors have chosen salaried employment over private practice and take turns providing consultations, like Mathilde Pottier, 30, who found it possible to do "only medical work".
"In private practice, the time constraints and the time spent on administrative tasks were a burden," she says. With medical secretaries present at the health center, "I was really able to free up that time," with the feeling of responding to a "real need."
In another center in Saint-Pierre-des-Corps (Indre-et-Loire), Belkacem Otsmane also turned to salaried employment after being "washed out by paperwork."
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"Freelance practice is good, but it exhausted me. When you arrive here, everything is made available to the doctor so he can practice: the center, the secretariat, the medical equipment," he summarizes.
By relocating doctors to "under-resourced" areas, Dr. Ostmane assures us: "we avoid a lot of hospitalizations by allowing people to be monitored."
According to the Region, the Centre-Val de Loire region is last in terms of medical density of general practitioners (101.8 per 100,000 inhabitants compared to 125.2 on average nationally).
Five out of six departments are below the average for mainland France and 25% of residents do not have a GP.
"We have multiplied initiatives in recent years to try to fill these gaps," assures the President of the Region François Bonneau (PS).
The Centre-Val de Loire region was the first region to employ healthcare professionals in 2019, but failed to meet the promise of 150 doctors in 2025, nor was it expected to meet the promise of 300 new hires in 2028.
A report from the regional audit office in 2023 also stated that this model had not yet "demonstrated its added value".
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"The objectives were ambitious, but all this is gaining momentum," believes Mr. Bonneau, indicating that participation in the regional Public Interest Group (GIP), which pays doctors' salaries, would be less than one million euros in 2026.
A gross salary of 5,500 euros is offered for a doctor at the start of his career.
"All areas of health are currently marked by recruitment difficulties, and what matters to us is to highlight working conditions," he adds.
"We were pioneers: Occitanie and the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region have since been moving in this direction," he said, "proof" of the project's interest, but also a form of new competition to attract new profiles.
75,000 consultations have already been carried out in 2025 by salaried doctors and more than 27,000 inhabitants of the Centre-Val de Loire region now have a primary care physician thanks to this system, according to the Region.
"There is still a lot to do, of course, but in the face of such concern, it is quite significant," concludes François Bonneau.
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