RPPS number (Répertoire partagé des professionnels de santé)

The RPPS is France's single reference directory for identifying health professionals, managed nationally by the Agence du numérique en santé (ANS). It records your civil status, contact details, diplomas and authorisations to practise, profession, registration with your order and your places of activity. Each professional receives an RPPS identifier of 11 digits that stays the same for your whole career, even if you move or change how you practise.

The RPPS replaced the older ADELI directory. The ARS Île-de-France now states that ADELI no longer exists and has been replaced by the RPPS, so professions once registered with the ARS, such as many paramedical professions, are also in the RPPS.

1. Obtain the right to practise. For PADHUE this is the autorisation d'exercice; for nurses and others it is the diploma or recognition that applies to them.
2. Register with your registration authority. For professions with an order, such as doctors, dentists, midwives, pharmacists, nurses, physiotherapists and podiatrists, the order is the registration desk. The Ordre national des pédicures-podologues, for example, says registration with the ARS is no longer needed because the order is now the registration authority.
3. Receive your number automatically. The order's information leaflet says an 11-digit RPPS identifier is attributed automatically once you are registered. There is no separate application.
4. Receive your CPS card. A CPS card (carte de professionnel de santé) carrying your RPPS identifier is sent after registration, with a PIN code.

• Billing and prescriptions. Your RPPS identifier must appear on your care sheets, assessments and prescriptions, so practice software must be configured with it.
• The CPS card. Your electronic professional identity card, used to produce electronic care sheets, access the shared medical record (DMP), secure messaging and other e-health services. The leaflet notes the card is valid for three years and renewed automatically.
• Public directory. The Annuaire Santé lists professionals registered in the national directories, so patients and employers can look you up.
• Health insurance. Local health insurance offices now consult the RPPS, so you no longer bring professional documents to them; self-employed professionals still declare their activity to the Assurance Maladie.

If you trained outside the EU, the RPPS comes near the end of your move, not the start. Doctors, dentists, midwives and pharmacists only reach it after the EVC, the consolidation period and the published authorisation order, when they register with their order. Before that, hospital employers identify you through your assignment and contract. EU-trained nurses and other professionals meet it when their order registers them after recognition of their diploma. Have your authorisation, diploma and ID ready in PDF form, because the nursing order, for example, takes registration requests online with PDF attachments.

• Confusing the RPPS number with your order number. You keep your registration number with the order as well; the RPPS number is the national identifier.
• Not reporting changes. Tell your order promptly about any change of address or practice so the directory stays accurate; the podiatrists' order, for example, asks for this within the month. Your RPPS number does not change, but a new CPS card may be issued.
• Expecting the number before registration. Employers sometimes ask for it early. It only exists once your order or authority has registered you.