Multidisciplinary group practices: A space for coordination of care for health professionals, patients and their close relatives

Abstract

Multidisciplinary group practices are being developed in the French healthcare system, following a reform of the supply of first-aid care. It has tried on the one hand to improve the coordination of care between different professionals (specialist doctors, general practitioners, paramedics) and on the other hand to increase the involvement of patients with chronic pathologies in the management of their care trajectory. MGPs are located at the meeting of these two issues. There are high expectations on these new structures. They must build a common area for the production of multidisciplinary care, where patients will also have to take a renewed role, especially when they suffer from a chronic pathology. The first results of a qualitative survey by interviews with doctors, paramedics, but also patients and their close relatives show that patient attitudes play a fundamental role in the possible deployment of coordinated care practices. Patients can act in accordance with the coordination logic of the MGP or promote other links between the different professionals following them. Previous care pathways, carers' resources (level of qualification, people in their entourage) and their reasoning in structuring their care are leading MGPs towards collegiality or recomposing them strongly towards modes of specialized and hierarchical arrangements of care.