New operating theatre and imaging suite (MRI and scanner)

The La Casamance private hospital inaugurated its new operating theatre and imaging facilities (MRI and scanner). A large number of doctors and paramedics from the region attended the event. Sylvia Barthélémy, President of the Pays d'Aubagne et de l'Étoile Agglo, Bernard Deflesselles, Member of Parliament for the Bouches-du-Rhône, Gérard Gazay, Mayor of Aubagne, elected representatives from across the region, Damien Flourez, Deputy Director of theAubagne public hospital, and members of the Regional Health Agency were all keen to attend, and visited the facilities with great interest and curiosity.

The La Casamance clinic was founded in 1956 by Henri Gautier, and was initially a convalescent home. Fifteen years later, under the management of Jean-Paul Gautier, the first 150-bed building was constructed. At the end of the 1980s, the surgical activity was developed by building the latest generation operating theatres, equipped with the best technology. The establishment then began to move towards a multidisciplinary activity. It now has a surgery, medicine, cardiac and functional rehabilitation department, as well as a state-of-the-art post-operative intensive care unit. Today, Jean-Henri Gautier is taking over as director. La Casamance became a private hospital in 2013, and is developing the most advanced medical techniques while improving reception and accommodation conditions through regular renovation programmes.

An MRI department opened in 2003

The list is a long one, to mention only the achievements of the last decade: construction of the building enabling the extension of surgery and medicine, merger with the La Polysiane clinic, opening of a senology department (diagnosis-screening), creation of a head and neck operating theatre and a dedicated outpatient department, renovation of the sterilisation department, opening of the continuous monitoring unit, restructuring of the general radiology department, extension of the outpatient surgery department, etc. This private clinic has never ceased to enhance and develop its investment in technology. Cancerology is an important activity here. With an MRI department opened in 2003, La Casamance carries out almost 12,000 cross-sectional MRI examinations a year, in addition to 18,000 scans. So it's hardly surprising that this department has been the focus of recent efforts.

The latest-generation General Electric scanner halves the dose of X-rays for patients, while improving image quality. This new equipment is also enabling the development of the "Coro scanner" technique, in conjunction with the 64-detector technology it is equipped with. The Siemens MRI offers greater comfort for patients, with a shorter, better-ventilated and better-lit tunnel, and noise reduced by a factor of three. Energy savings of more than 50% will be achieved on these two pieces of equipment. Work on the operating theatre has resulted in the creation of three highly aseptic, laminar-flow rooms, capable of performing all types of operation, including prostheses. In the middle of the suite, a renovated and enlarged recovery room can accommodate more than twenty patients simultaneously after their operation.

For 2015, the newspaper Le Point has published its rankings of French health establishments. In five specialities, La Casamance private hospital ranks in the top fifty private establishments: obesity surgery (2nd), gall bladder surgery (16th), myocardial infarction care (31st), abdominal hernia surgery (37th) and pneumology care (41st).