Algerian Doctor’s French Dream Turns Nightmare: Hospital Exclusion Sparks Legal Battle

A short-lived adventure. Equipped with a medical doctorate obtained in 2015 at the Faculty of Algiers (Algeria), an Algerian woman practices in her country as a "resuscitation general practitioner", before trying the French adventure. She arrives in France in 2021. After participating in a "verification" of her medical knowledge in October 2023, she is "retained" in early January 2024 and was assigned to the Fougères hospital center. This woman settled in Essonne began practicing in the emergency room in May 2024 as part of an associate practitioner contract that was to extend until April 14, 2026. "But very quickly, the relations deteriorated," traced her lawyer, Rivka Tordjman, from the Paris bar.

According to her, her client felt "spied on", "ostracized" and "humiliated" by her head of department and her peers, reports Actu.fr. The doctor claims to have also been a victim of "harassment" very shortly after the start of her contract. In July 2024, she had been summoned by the hospital director to "return her intern room". Present at the hearing, Adrien Tharrault, director of medical affairs at the Fougères hospital, clarifies: "We housed her free of charge in the intern quarters in order to support her, but I had indicated to her from the beginning that this could only be a temporary decision".

But the problems pile up for the Algerian woman. In February 2025, Tharrault summons her to notify her, in the presence of a department head, of the "suspension" of her duties "in the interest of the service". On May 13, 2025, the hospital management orders her to "resume her duties". She complies. But things do not improve for the associate practitioner. After disciplinary proceedings initiated against her, on June 12, 2025, she is definitively excluded from the status of associate practitioner on July 11, 2025 for "professional incompetence".

Outraged, she brings the case before the administrative court of Rennes to obtain the suspension of her definitive exclusion. This definitive exclusion prevents her from completing her "finalization process". Her lawyer points to a violation of the Public Health Code. According to her explanations, while the text imposed a delay of "two months" between "the initiation of the procedure" and her "exclusion", only "thirty days" separated the two decisions. The decision of the administrative court of Rennes is expected "at the latest within a week", the duty judge informs.