Working in Lyon as a healthcare professional: cancer care, transplants and infectious diseases

Lyon is one of France's leading hospital cities for cancer care, transplantation and liver medicine, and infectious diseases. It is home to the Hospices Civils de Lyon (HCL), the city's university hospital trust, to the Centre Léon Bérard, a dedicated cancer centre, and to the headquarters of the World Health Organization's International Agency for Research on Cancer. If you are an EU-trained healthcare professional choosing where to settle, Lyon is a place where specialist care and research sit side by side.

Lyon's hospitals at a glance

Everything starts with the Hospices Civils de Lyon. Their 2024 key figures list 13 hospitals, 5,141 beds and day places, and 24,073 staff by headcount, including 5,606 medical staff and 11,603 nursing and rehabilitation staff. The trust describes itself as "the 2nd university hospital in France" (« 2e CHU de France »). Alongside it, the Centre Léon Bérard handles much of the city's oncology, while several public and international research institutes have clustered in the Gerland district.

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Cancer care: Lyon's signature

The Centre Léon Bérard is one of the 18 French cancer centres (centres de lutte contre le cancer) in the Unicancer network. According to its institutional brochure, in 2025 it employed 2,424 people, including 324 doctors and more than 600 researchers, ran 345 beds and places, and treated 44,008 patients, 11,317 of them new. Care and research happen in the same building, often in the same team.

Its areas of expertise are clearly defined: sarcomas and rare tumours, solid tumours in children, and paediatric radiotherapy. The centre coordinates NetSarc, a national sarcoma network accredited by France's National Cancer Institute (INCa), and EURACAN, the European Reference Network for rare adult solid cancers. It holds INCa accreditation for early-phase trials in both adults and children, renewed in 2024. For children, the Institute of Paediatric Haematology and Oncology (IHOPe) has 52 beds and places shared between the HCL and the Centre Léon Bérard. If oncology nursing or medicine is your field, this means working with teams used to research protocols and complex cases.

Research shapes the city too. LYriCAN+, an integrated cancer research site run jointly by the HCL and the Centre Léon Bérard, was re-accredited by INCa in January 2023 as one of eight such sites (SIRIC) in France. And since May 2023, the International Agency for Research on Cancer (press release in French), the WHO's specialised cancer agency, has worked from a new building in the Lyon-Gerland Biodistrict, with 27 participating states.

Transplants, heart and liver: the HCL's referral role

Transplantation is Lyon's other strength. In Bron, Louis-Pradel Hospital brings together cardiology, cardiovascular and thoracic surgery and paediatric cardiology. According to the HCL, it performs more than 50 heart and lung transplants a year and has around 400 beds and places. Intensive care, theatres, follow-up clinics for transplant recipients: this kind of activity relies on large, highly specialised teams.

Liver medicine now has its own university hospital institute. IHU EVEREST, selected under the France 2030 investment plan, receives €20 million from May 2024 to April 2034 to work on viral hepatitis, fatty liver disease, hepatocellular carcinoma and liver transplantation. Of the 19 university hospital institutes (IHU) listed by France's National Research Agency, it is the only one based in Lyon.

Two more HCL hospitals round out the picture. Pierre-Wertheimer Neurological Hospital treats stroke, multiple sclerosis, epilepsy, Parkinson's disease and brain tumours; it hosts a Parkinson's expert centre and two national reference centres for rare neurological diseases. The Femme Mère Enfant Hospital, a level 3 maternity unit, recorded 4,170 births in 2024 and has 514 beds and places, a useful benchmark for midwives and paediatric staff.

Infectious diseases and biotech in Gerland

Lyon is also a city of infectious disease research. The International Center for Infectiology Research (CIRI), set up in 2013 by Claude Bernard University Lyon 1, Inserm, the CNRS and the ENS de Lyon, has more than 20 teams. In Lyon, the Jean Mérieux-Inserm P4 laboratory is, according to a 2014 Inserm presentation, a biosafety level 4 laboratory (the highest level) dedicated to the study of class 4 pathogens.

Around these labs, Lyonbiopôle, a health competitiveness cluster, coordinates the BCF2I biocluster on emerging pathogens and antimicrobial resistance, together with companies such as Sanofi, bioMérieux and Boehringer Ingelheim, the CIRI, Bioaster and the HCL. For clinical staff, this ecosystem means infectious disease departments closely linked to research, and possible bridges into clinical research roles.

Which healthcare professionals will find what?

• Doctors: referral departments (transplants, hepatology, neurology, oncology), clinical trials and research institutes.
• Nurses: adult and paediatric oncology, intensive care and transplant follow-up, neurology, infectious diseases.
• Midwives: the level 3 maternity unit at Femme Mère Enfant Hospital and care for high-risk pregnancies.
• Physiotherapists and occupational therapists: rehabilitation after major surgery or transplantation, neurology (stroke, Parkinson's, MS).
• Aides-soignants: the university hospital trust alone accounts for thousands of care jobs across 13 hospitals.

None of this is a promise of a job: needs vary from one department to another and from year to year. Vacancies are published on the institutions' own websites.

Everyday life in Lyon

Lyon sits where the Rhône and the Saône meet, in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region. The big hospitals are not all in the city centre: several HCL sites, including Louis-Pradel, Pierre-Wertheimer and Femme Mère Enfant, are in Bron, on the eastern side of the metropolitan area, while the research institutes are concentrated in Gerland, to the south. Before you look for a flat, check where your target hospital is and how you would get there.

For the practical side (bank account, health insurance, your first weeks), read our guide to settling in France as an EU healthcare worker, then our article on finding housing in France. For pay, see our article on healthcare salaries in France.

From idea to application

How you can practise in Lyon depends on your profession and your qualification. Start with the guide for your job: doctor, nurse, midwife, physiotherapist, occupational therapist or aide-soignant. For the big picture, read our general guide to practising in France with a European healthcare qualification.

Choosing a city before your paperwork is finished is not jumping the gun. It helps you picture your new life, target the right hospitals and time your applications well. If oncology, transplantation or infectious diseases are what drive you, Lyon deserves a place on your shortlist.