Save the NHS!

[scorza]

Good luck today, although I fear you're playing right into the Tory party's hands. Expect every death today will be scrutinised by party spin doctors.

 

[Uther]

Luckily my wife's got a procedure booked for tomorrow! Surely it will take months to clear the backlog...

 

[deuse]

Good luck with the strike.

+1

 

[FrenchTart]

Good luck with the strike guys.

 

[Minstadave]

Good luck today, although I fear you're playing right into the Tory party's hands. Expect every death today will be scrutinised by party spin doctors.

Cover today is the same as bank holidays/Xmas day - so if the government are happy with that level of cover on those days they can't complain. In reality the cover will be better than those days as there has been contingency planning for several months and extra senior cover brought in.

 

[scorza]

Cover today is the same as bank holidays/Xmas day - so if the government are happy with that level of cover on those days they can't complain. In reality the cover will be better than those days as there has been contingency planning for several months and extra senior cover brought in.

The mistake you're making there is thinking that logic and rational thinking apply here. You and I know that the level of cover today is safe, but to the general public watching a grieving family blame the junior doctors on the evening news, the level of cover is irrelevant.

 

[albert]

So the Junior Doctors are striking because they are overworked blah blah.
4000 operations cancelled today, appointments cancelled and tests cancelled which means when the strike is over they will have MORE work.
I don't agree with strikes and I don't trust Unions one bit. If you don't like your job, just get another one...

 

[platypus]

So the Junior Doctors are striking because they are overworked blah blah.
4000 operations cancelled today, appointments cancelled and tests cancelled which means when the strike is over they will have MORE work.
I don't agree with strikes and I don't trust Unions one bit. If you don't like your job, just get another one...

You might think twice about saying this if you were in the same position.

 

[Trifid]

So the Junior Doctors are striking because they are overworked blah blah.
4000 operations cancelled today, appointments cancelled and tests cancelled which means when the strike is over they will have MORE work.
I don't agree with strikes and I don't trust Unions one bit. If you don't like your job, just get another one...

A few points:

We need doctors
The government have a monopoly on employment
Junior Doctors have invested a lot of time and money into becoming a doctor and it doesn't really pay well for a long time (and despite the prefix, they have a lot of responsibility)

Essentially their options are:
Leave the country and seek employment elsewhere (very easily done)
Stick up for their jobs

So would you prefer happy junior doctors or no doctors in future?

I don't usually support strike action but I think they are being reasonable here.

 

[alx]

A few points:

We need doctors
The government have a monopoly on employment
Junior Doctors have invested a lot of time and money into becoming a doctor and it doesn't really pay well for a long time (and despite the prefix, they have a lot of responsibility)

Essentially their options are:
Leave the country and seek employment elsewhere (very easily done)
Stick up for their jobs

So would you prefer happy junior doctors or no doctors in future?

I don't usually support strike action but I think they are being reasonable here.

This, there comes a time when you have to draw a line in the sand and make a stand when you feel you're royally being bent over.

The sad fact is a lot of UK doctors do go abroad for better working conditions/pay, which is why about a 1/3rd of doctors in the UK are foreign born.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/12071030/More-than-a-third-of-NHS-doctors-born-abroad.html

 

[Dolph]

This, there comes a time when you have to draw a line in the sand and make a stand when you feel you're royally being bent over.

The sad fact is a lot of UK doctors do go abroad for better working conditions/pay, which is why about a 1/3rd of doctors in the UK are foreign born.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/12071030/More-than-a-third-of-NHS-doctors-born-abroad.html

The problem with relying on feelings of injustice is that it is a very subjective reason to leave people in pain due to their operation being cancelled by refusing to work.

 

[alx]

The problem with relying on feelings of injustice is that it is a very subjective reason to leave people in pain due to their operation being cancelled by refusing to work.

I do see your point, and that it is really a lose lose situation when the government plays hard ball and patient care suffers but what else are they meant to do? Let themselves be screwed over continuously until no one wants to be a doctor anymore?

 

[Dolph]

I do see your point, and that it is really a lose lose situation when the government plays hard ball and patient care suffers but what else are they meant to do? Let themselves be screwed over continuously until no one wants to be a doctor anymore?

Well, the most obvious solution is to remove the government monopoly on employment, but I doubt that would be popular either. The problem is this means doctors then compete for resources on merit (and negotiation ability) rather than a generic contract, and that isn't popular especially with those on the lower end of performance, experience or negotiation ability.

The other issue is that, historically, doctors have had a good contract. This makes changes, however good and patient centric, likely to reduce the position of doctors. That isn't necessarily wrong on an objective view. All businesses and services have to balance their staffing needs and staff compensation against the needs of their customers and the available budget, but it is certainly easy to feel aggrieved when your rewards are reduced, even if they were objectively excessive or poor practice to start with (looking at you annual increments).

 

[Danthus]

Well, the most obvious solution is to remove the government monopoly on employment, but I doubt that would be popular either. The problem is this means doctors then compete for resources on merit (and negotiation ability) rather than a generic contract, and that isn't popular especially with those on the lower end of performance, experience or negotiation ability.

The other issue is that, historically, doctors have had a good contract. This makes changes, however good and patient centric, likely to reduce the position of doctors. That isn't necessarily wrong on an objective view. All businesses and services have to balance their staffing needs and staff compensation against the needs of their customers and the available budget, but it is certainly easy to feel aggrieved when your rewards are reduced, even if they were objectively excessive or poor practice to start with (looking at you annual increments).

Non of the junior doctors I spoke to this morning Dolph talked about anything other than what the changes mean for patients. An A&E Consultant said the proposed changes risked the safety of patients.

The BMA rep said they want to find an agreement, don't forget, it was Hun who initially refused to deal with ACAS.

 

[FrenchTart]

Well, the most obvious solution is to remove the government monopoly on employment, but I doubt that would be popular either. The problem is this means doctors then compete for resources on merit (and negotiation ability) rather than a generic contract, and that isn't popular especially with those on the lower end of performance, experience or negotiation ability.

The other issue is that, historically, doctors have had a good contract. This makes changes, however good and patient centric, likely to reduce the position of doctors. That isn't necessarily wrong on an objective view. All businesses and services have to balance their staffing needs and staff compensation against the needs of their customers and the available budget, but it is certainly easy to feel aggrieved when your rewards are reduced, even if they were objectively excessive or poor practice to start with (looking at you annual increments).

You seem to be basically saying that the changes are a good thing. How does that square up with your general view on retaining good staff when essentially the doctors that are able to do so are taking more attractive jobs abroad are doing so? Surely worsening the job conditions in the NHS is just going to encourage that behaviour?

 

[Tunney]

The problem with relying on feelings of injustice is that it is a very subjective reason to leave people in pain due to their operation being cancelled by refusing to work.

16,397 operations were cancelled at the last minute for non-clinical reasons during Q3 2015. The number of cancelled operations has been rising since the Conservatives took power.

The junior doctor's strike is a drop in the ocean - especially when it has long-term benefits to the public.

 

[shadow_boxer]

Typical attitude of NHS managers at Sandwell District General Hospital today.

Monday 11th January 2016

Dr Roger Stedman, Medical Director at Sandwell and West Birmingham Hospitals NHS Trust, said: “We have worked closely with our senior medical staff to ensure that there is appropriate cover for the clinical work that is to be undertaken. Our priority is to maintain safe care for our patients.

Tuesday 12th January 2016 10:00am

Dr Roger Stedman, Medical Director at Sandwell and West Birmingham Hospitals NHS Trust, said: “Over the last two days we have had very high numbers of patients come to hospital, and fewer than usual discharged.

Note the letter dated on the 11th and was circulated on the morning of the industrial action.

This was clearly not an incident but merely Winter pressure and sadly just another example the attitude of managers to bully junior staff. Glad that the BMA's advice was sought and Sandwell have now conveniently downgraded to level 3 and clarified themselves this was no incident!

 

[danielanthony]

More money should go into the NHS but its current funding model is unsustainable.

Demand is unchecked as its seen as a 'free' resource, so people use its resources inefficiently.

We could reach this utopian 11% of GDP spending on health if we had some sort of compulsory insurance/pay-as-you-go model.

It seems like the BMA are arguing that the NHS should remain free so that people continue to use its resources without restraint, thus driving up demand, thus requiring a never ending expansion of staff and resources.

 

[Dolph]

16,397 operations were cancelled at the last minute for non-clinical reasons during Q3 2015. The number of cancelled operations has been rising since the Conservatives took power.

The junior doctor's strike is a drop in the ocean - especially when it has long-term benefits to the public.

You don't think 4,000 ops in a single day, nearly 25% of the total for a quarter, is significant?

Really?

 

[Dolph]

You seem to be basically saying that the changes are a good thing. How does that square up with your general view on retaining good staff when essentially the doctors that are able to do so are taking more attractive jobs abroad are doing so? Surely worsening the job conditions in the NHS is just going to encourage that behaviour?

If there is a major recruitment problem, it would matter, but the leakage of NHS trained staff can be addressed in other ways too, and this could be addressed, as I mentioned, by moving away from national contracts and national pay bargaining.

Without the full information, making a fully informed decision is not possible as to whether there are alternative options for fixing the imbalances in NHS performance, but that doesn't mean I will take the BMA's position at face value either, especially when their list of demands is clearly mostly about pay, not anything else.

http://www.bma.org.uk/working-for-c...act/ddrb-recommendations-analysis-for-juniors