6 Day Doctors Strike

Glorianny my husband seems to think that excess deaths are occurring now.

No you have misunderstood entirely. No one is suggesting that doctors should not be paid a reasonable rate with good working conditions. However what is beginning to be beyond acceptable is the way these negotiations are handled.

Bit of a red herring about male doctors assaulting female doctors? I wasn’t expecting that.

A lot of female doctors become GPs, where part time working by female doctors with children seems almost to be the norm if my current and previous surgeries are anything to go by. A considerable bonus for a woman who wants to keep her professional status, earn good money and work part time. I would have loved the ability to do that.

GSM you might have enjoyed working for NHS Resolution? I think family friendly working conditions apply. Probably not around when you were looking for work?

ronib

Glorianny my husband seems to think that excess deaths are occurring now.

No you have misunderstood entirely. No one is suggesting that doctors should not be paid a reasonable rate with good working conditions. However what is beginning to be beyond acceptable is the way these negotiations are handled.

Bit of a red herring about male doctors assaulting female doctors? I wasn’t expecting that.

They may be, but I gave you two examples to look at because I think if there is evidence that as unacceptable deaths took place here during covid, not elsewhere, and are also happening now, the common denominator cannot be the doctors' strike.

I agree about the negotiations but if the government will not engage in debate what else can be done?

I think saying female doctors just want more money is far more unacceptable and my post reveals one reason they step back from advancement.

I doubt your friend were on the wards and clinics within six weeks of matriculating, Ronib. Back then, medicine was lecture hall based and they didn’t see a patients for years. It’s not as if the old style of studying medicine produced a generation of stellar doctors, either. I’m sure many of us have stories of poor service by older doctors, being ignored, patronised, or told not to worry our silly little heads especially when it comes to childbirth and babies.

On the topic of excess deaths, there is a report today about that very same occurring in Scotland, where doctors are not on strike.

NHS Resolution is paying out significant sums for negligence in the NHS £2.6 billion I believe. The House of Lords has expressed concern at this level of payment.
Let’s see what next week brings? The strike should be over in a few days so negotiations may resume. Or not …

SueDonim

On the topic of excess deaths, there is a report today about that very same occurring in Scotland, where doctors are not on strike.

Same in Wales SueDonim, a lot of it seems to be attributed to delays in diagnosis during the pandemic.
The negotiation in the other nations has been more successful at warding off junior doctor strikes so far than it has in England, because there has been continuing dialogue with the doctors unions. However, they cannot unilaterally raise the pay rates significantly.

ronib

GSM you might have enjoyed working for NHS Resolution? I think family friendly working conditions apply. Probably not around when you were looking for work?

Not my field. I was a transactional lawyer working for property developers. Not a litigation lawyer. Nothing remotely family friendly about what I did.

If we are using our husband’s as the source of knowledge, I can bring in mr i who died 15 month ago. But- he raged about the increasing death rate and corresponding lower age of death. This doesn’t mean he agrees with ronib’ a husband. Part of Mr i’s job was to track death rates in the large local authority he was employed in. He tracked the increase and linked it directly to the austerity programme.

Gloryanny - thank you so much for setting out the background to the doctors strike

Greece is struggling to retain doctors, they’re off to Germany for more money and better conditions

Iam64 Greece produces very fine doctors and one of my sons has had firm diagnosis from a Greek doctor which sadly wasn’t forthcoming from anyone here. You do realise that Greece produces more doctors than it needs? I wish they would come here!
There’s so much information online about excess deaths if one has the inclination to look…. I shall try to appreciate my husband more and I am sorry for your loss.

I don’t know, but I suspect that excess deaths are being caused by the delay in diagnosis and therefore treatment. The delays must be being caused by too many patients served by too few medics.
I don’t understand why anyone wouldn’t want doctors to be paid properly for the work they do. I don’t understand why anyone would resent their pensions. I don’t understand why anyone would be happy with PAs, only trained for two years, to be replacing doctors. I don’t understand why anyone is unconcerned about the number of doctors who are leaving the country to work abroad where they can enjoy higher salaries and a better work/life balance.

Incidentally I’m currently in New Zealand, where my doctor daughter lives and works. She tells me pay isn’t greatly better here, but conditions of work are much better. She would like to return home to live, but at the moment, personal circumstances prevent this, but she also tells me, if she was returning now, she would have to compete with PAs to get a job. PAs have only done one quarter of the initial training she did. She was at medical school at a London university for six years (three years engaged in clinical practice) and then did F1 and F2 at a hospital outside London. That was merely her basic training. She went on to do a further year in Mental Health and followed that that by three full years training to be a GP which involved sitting further examinations. Why should she have to compete with an under trained PA (trained for only two years) to get a job? But that’s what’s happening and it’s frightening. People will undoubtedly die as a result of this situation. Sometimes it’s difficult for a fully trained doctor to diagnose a condition, so why are we happy to allow people with so little training to diagnose?
It’s really quite frightening!

There are literally hundreds of GP posts currently advertised in the UK maddyone, I just had a quick look online. These weren’t either/or jobs, they were specifically for GPs.
According to the GMC there are currently around 3000 PAs in the UK, across all fields of medicine, not just general practice. There are around 37,000 GPs. I really don’t think your daughter would have any difficulty at all finding a GP job should she return to the UK, which I hope she decides to do.

Oh thank you Casdon, I thought as much but she seems worried about it. I hope she comes home soon but circumstances are difficult for her at the moment. I miss her so much and we want to help her more but it’s difficult when we’re so far away for most of the year.

But we should all be concerned about the use of PAs in medical practice. I think I’d rather see a nurse practitioner than a PA to be honest.

I do understand the concerns, I think the role can work well in hospital settings where the PA has very clear guidelines, sees patients who are there for a specific procedure or examination and there is supervision. It’s much harder to do that in general practice.
What I don’t understand is why the practices themselves are deciding to appoint PAs. Theres a very clear role for practice pharmacists, as they have a range of knowledge that GPs don’t, and that seems to work very well in most practices, but the only reason I can think why a practice would employ a PA is financial, or maybe it is the managed practices who can’t recruit GPs at all that are employing them - which is worrying if there is not sufficient supervision.

I think we need a punchy ITV drama about people dying in ambulances while Tory Ministers do nothing. If it works for postmasters why not for patients?

Grantanow I hate to think how many will die if you’re expecting Tory ministers to offer treatment? Just in case you hadn’t noticed it was the junior doctors who had downed tools.

Glorianny

ronib

Glorianny my husband seems to think that excess deaths are occurring now.

No you have misunderstood entirely. No one is suggesting that doctors should not be paid a reasonable rate with good working conditions. However what is beginning to be beyond acceptable is the way these negotiations are handled.

Bit of a red herring about male doctors assaulting female doctors? I wasn’t expecting that.

They may be, but I gave you two examples to look at because I think if there is evidence that as unacceptable deaths took place here during covid, not elsewhere, and are also happening now, the common denominator cannot be the doctors' strike.

I agree about the negotiations but if the government will not engage in debate what else can be done?

I think saying female doctors just want more money is far more unacceptable and my post reveals one reason they step back from advancement.

Unacceptable deaths only in the UK, I don't think so. A political statement if ever there was one.Sure Labour would do no better, in fact St starmer wanted to lock us up for longer, causing even more mental health and educational problems.
Countries in Europe also had many deaths, some more than us per million. This will happen during a pandemic which no country had a handle on.

Freya5

Glorianny

ronib

Glorianny my husband seems to think that excess deaths are occurring now.

No you have misunderstood entirely. No one is suggesting that doctors should not be paid a reasonable rate with good working conditions. However what is beginning to be beyond acceptable is the way these negotiations are handled.

Bit of a red herring about male doctors assaulting female doctors? I wasn’t expecting that.

They may be, but I gave you two examples to look at because I think if there is evidence that as unacceptable deaths took place here during covid, not elsewhere, and are also happening now, the common denominator cannot be the doctors' strike.

I agree about the negotiations but if the government will not engage in debate what else can be done?

I think saying female doctors just want more money is far more unacceptable and my post reveals one reason they step back from advancement.

Unacceptable deaths only in the UK, I don't think so. A political statement if ever there was one.Sure Labour would do no better, in fact St starmer wanted to lock us up for longer, causing even more mental health and educational problems.
Countries in Europe also had many deaths, some more than us per million. This will happen during a pandemic which no country had a handle on.

Try reading the whole thread not just one post. Ireland had no excess deaths during covid www.gov.ie/en/press-release/26bd4-oecd-research-shows-ireland-avoided-excess-deaths-during-core-pandemic-years/
Which was what I referred to.

Glorianny How can you compare an agrarian society with a population of 5 million to that of an over packed country approaching 70 million? Etc etc

ronib

Glorianny How can you compare an agrarian society with a population of 5 million to that of an over packed country approaching 70 million? Etc etc

I wasn't I was pointing out that excess deaths are not as you claim linked with the doctor's strike. But it is interesting how can a largely agrarian society pay its doctors more than a highly developed country?
meddoc.ie/why-working-in-healthcare-in-ireland-beats-healthcare-work-in-the-uk/

Exactly Glorianny. In addition, recent research confirms the earlier age and increased death rate is linked to the unnecessary austerity policy.