i am currently applying for RESIDENCY in France… or will ehen the website finally comes up!
I usually spend upto 6 months in France 2 months in the UK and 3 months travelling outside Europe.
I get the majority of my health treatment on the NHS (I have Cardiac Artery Disease and have STENTS fitted and I am an outpatient at MOORFIELDS EYE HOSPITAL). Have a UK EHIC for emergencies in France and a global travel health insurance policy.
So the question is will I be able to use the NHS after I become resident and would that be chargeable? And/OR would I be covered by the French Health Service for my long term conditions (heart disease and blindness). I am 64 and have a large income and houses in France the UK and the USA.
Ant answers or advice would be welcome.
GOOD OLD BREXIT the vote that keeps on taking away! lol
Part of being accepted as a resident in France will be either being a member of the French health service or proving that you have adequate private health insurance. As the NHS is residency based the only way that you can still be a French resident and have NHS care is to be retired and hold an S1. At the moment being in that position enables you to use the NHS but I don’t have a clue whether that will still be the case after the end of the year.
The normal action when moving residency would be to get your health care in your new country of residence. It is quite likely that your conditions will be considered to be ALDs nd will therefore be covered at 100%.
Do you have your UK state pension or not? At 64 I’m guessing you don’t?
In general you can only be attached to the social security system of one country. So if you join the French state system you will no longer be eligible for free at point of service NHS care, but can still go private and pay. For emergency care in the UK you will get a French equivalent of an EHIC (calledCEAM).
If you join the French Health Service you will be covered for everything as any French person. Which is that for most things 50-70% of the costs will be covered, and for many chronic conditions you will be covered 100%. You can take out insurance for the rest of the costs (called a mutuelle), and again pre-existing conditions are included. This is the list of chronic conditions that are more or less entirely paid for by the health service
Rather than occupying yourself with a residency card which isn’t essential for a year yet, wouldn’t it be more sensible to start to take the steps to join the health service?
That is why I am asking, I cannot apply now till October So I thought I would try and sort out the health issues. What is the mechanism whereby the NHS is informed? I guess one of my worries is the changeover as I might die instance require heart surgery in the day residence starts but I might be in the UK.
Make sure that you don’t travel until the paperwork is complete. Are you already in France? If so what healthcare cover do you have at the moment? It might be worth taking out private health cover until you have joined the French system.
Both countries would always treat someone in an emergency even if they had no paperwork whatsoever.
Quite often when you apply to join the french health service they ask you to get a letter from the NHS to confirm that you are no longer covered. Given your age this is quite probable as they will want to check you shouldn’t be coming with an S1.
Get a copy of your health record, or summary of your medical history and find a GP. This is first step to being referred to a cardiologist and specialist ophthalmologist. Depending where you are geographically in France the waiting list can be long. However, GPs are usually helpful about prescribing any drugs you need in the interim.
In parallel make your application to CPAM to join the health service. This can take a few weeks. In the interim you will have to pay for any drugs or appointments, but you will be repaid from the date your application is accepted.
Pete,
I hope you won’t mind me saying this, but from what you have told us about yourself, I think you should give up the jet setting lifestyle, find somewhere quiet to live, eat regular home cooked meals and get yourself a dog that will take you for long walks.
It would be reassuring to be close to one of our excellent French hospitals, but you might need their services less often.
I have two dogs and rarely eat out and enjoy cooking I am also in a regular French walking group in Lodeve but generally walk 5 km a day, I don’t drink smoke or eat meat Unfortunately my heart disease is MicroVascular inherited from my father and is not as a result of LIFESTYLE indeed I get most of my Angina attacks at around 3 am while asleep. Similarly my blindness is caused by detached retinas and Keracatonus again hereditary. I lead a perfectly normal life with 6 monthly hospital visits as an outpatient my businesses pay taxes in the UK and France.
So yes I do mind your ill informed and rude comment.
Sincerest apologies, I must have misunderstood your comment about three months travelling outside Europe.
No offence intended. Take care.
Looking at the long duration illness list it sounds like you’re a “artériopathies chroniques avec manifestations ischémiques” man. I’m a “troubles du rythme graves” man myself (arrhythmia).
For family reasons we spend a couple of months a year in Dublin so I need to manage my heart issue in both countries. It’s not easy. For example, my cardiologist in Dublin prescribed a new treatment for me in March (which is working very well, thank goodness). It requires occasional ECGs and Untrasounds to monitor things. However in France it’s your cardiologist who actually does the ECG and Ultrasound so one needs a French cardiologist as well. So, I’ve two cardiologists, not a simple situation ether professionally or interpersonally. Luckily, I have an excellent relationship with both and I respectfully minimise any impact my nomadic lifestyle has on them. My MT (GP) is also very understanding as is my French neighbour, who is also a GP and knocks out the odd script for blood tests etc.
All my medical costs in France are covered by my S1 from Ireland and my mutuel (though as I mentioned at the top of this ramble, heart stuff is 100% covered). I have private health cover in Ireland because the public health service there is overloaded and I can’t hang around on waiting lists if I’m back and forth to France. It costs around €2,500 PA but I have no other choice.
Bottom line, what I think I am trying to say is that managing a serious illness and having a mobile lifestyle are not terribly compatible, and you, unfortunately, have two illnesses to consider. It can be done but it requires planning, effort, expense and the goodwill of the professionals involved.
I wish you all the best 
He said he was ill Mike, not dead 
I have micro-vascular ischemia / angina and this was not accepted as sufficiently serious heart disease to qualify for the ALD as my main coronary arteries are fine. It seems you have to have a stent to qualify…
EDIT; just read you do have stents…so you will be covered 100%
Yes, I had read that Jane. But I also think one’s GP has an element of flexibility. Though my views on “flexibility” may not be shared by all. 
Anyway, a good mutual plan would pick up any slack.
If you have a mutuelle…which we don’t.
Oh, isn’t that risky? Can you lean on the GP for a “classification” upgrade. I’m sure some are stricter than others and some more sympathetic. Is your medication expensive? My tablets are at least 200 a month.
I find it ironic that under the Irish system I’d have to pay the first 130 a month myself, but with an S1 the Irish Health service have to pick up the whole tab.
I have another ALD - thankfully as the drugs for that are around 1000€/month - but the heart is pretty stable so just 6 monthly check ups. And my doctor tucks those and the cardiac rehabilitation under my ALD bless her! So this year my health costs have been under 30€ so far (fingers crossed).
Surprised your tablets are that much. I have a stent and take the usual cocktail, which I normally get free on prescription when I return to the UK but had to get a local prescription during the Covid lockdown and it cost me €30 for a month - atorvastatin, candesartan, diltiazem and aspirin.
From what I can see here you will not be eligible to access NHS treatment once you are French resident as you are too young to qualify for S1 on age grounds and there are no other obvious routes for this. However if, as you say, you are paying French taxes on your French investments, then I assume it will not be difficult to arrange things to become fully French tax resident and pay into the social fund, which in turn gives you the gateway into the French system.
Personally, I am in limbo at the moment as I reach state pension age 10 days before the end of the transition period, so I will be eligible for an S1 but not yet. Hopefully all will go well, with the extra 6 months period in which to apply covering admin cock-ups and delays (fingers crossed).
Is there some process available to get things at least started in UK… claiming Pension and the associated S1… ???
Not until I am at most 4 months before the date for the pension. S1 may well have to wait for eligibility - I can’t find any public information on that but will contact Newcastle once I am eligible to apply for the pension and see what they say.