Resident (Junior) Doctors vote to strike

We do actually want to keep doctors in the UK, don't we?

As one Resident doctor said in an interview I listened to, she said some of the doctors were not striking as they actually could not afford to.

For goodness sake, these are people we rely on to save our lives..often dedicated, face the most appalling choices, have to know and work so fast now....

And they can't afford two days of work.

Have we all lost our minds?

🫢

MaizieD I posted earlier about my positive experiences of post and antenatal care in 1984 and 1986. I could detail the complications with 1984 but it’s enough to say the senior midwife called I helped me de,Uber my 8lb8 z face to pubes baby with no stitches or forceps.
Two of my grandchildren 2016 and 2018 born at the same hospital,both by planned C section. Fantastic care of my daughter and her babies. Ward so accommodating of family visiting. Less personal care pre birth but excellent post natal care

I'm sad that the resident doctors are going ahead with their strike, I think it is a huge mistake. They have genuine grievances but this is not the way to get them addressed as I think Streeting is basically on their side and understands the issues.
I gave birth in the mid 70's and at the end of the 80's, both elective caesarians and I spent 8 weeks in hospital prior to the first birth with pre-eclampsia. I was well looked after and the food was definitely better than it is now.
Interestingly, doctors, including consultants, went on strike for the first time in 1975 for similar reasons to now. I think many have forgotten this.

I wonder how much worse your birthing experience might be now MaizieD?
Doctors definitely going ahead with 5 day strike from Friday…..

With two positive NHS birth experiences from 40+ years ago I can't join in the condemnation of NHS maternity care. It is inevitable that there are failures in any large (enormous) organisations but to blame them solely on the staff present at the time is really not quite fair. I think we have to look much deeper for reasons. Chronic underfunding and constant 'reorganisations to suit ideology of what is essentially a political football has to be explored and seriously considered.

ronib

I have zero expectation of anyone giving me any answers on Gransnet MaizieD. It’s a recent awareness on my part that maternity care is problematic here and I had hoped this would be of interest on this thread. My mistake.

Maternity care is problematic here; whether it is worse than 40 years ago is debatable but my own distressing experience from then, along with someone else I know whose child was starved of oxygen at birth with devastating consequences (she was left alone too, different part of the country) makes me think nothing has changed.

The fact that midwives did not have to be trained nurses was a worrying development too, I feel but now they are required to undertake more rigorous training.

I have zero expectation of anyone giving me any answers on Gransnet MaizieD. It’s a recent awareness on my part that maternity care is problematic here and I had hoped this would be of interest on this thread. My mistake.

Your facile generalisations are stunning, ronib. What percentage of babies born in England does the £27billion cover?

What attempts have you made to really understand the problems facing the NHS, apart from asking AI to summarise a report for you?

Why are you expecting random people on social media to give you definitive answers?

It’s not the blame game at all foxie48. Don’t you think it’s vital to understand exactly how the NHS has ended up with such a huge bill for compensation for mistakes ? Other countries seem to approach childbirth differently. Or does this country never improve upon its practices? I never did fall for Amanda Pritchard’s line that the NHS offered the best value for money. Clearly it doesn’t.

foxie48

Which staff in attendance? Women in labour wards are attended to by many staff because labour doesn't fit into neat packets of time that fit shifts. Do you blame the doctor or midwife who couldn't leave another patient because they needed urgent help, the one who hadn't noticed a change in fetal heart beat and had gone home at the end of their shift, perhaps the one who'd called in sick at the last moment meaning there was insufficient staff to run safely. There's so many possible people to pick.
This attitude of "someone has to be blamed" runs deep in our society when perhaps people are doing their best to keep going because they are working in extremely stressful and difficult. environments. I don't think anyone goes to work intending to be negligent do they?
A major city hospital has to cancel operations in one of its theatres if heavy rain is forecast because sewage comes up through the sinks. You couldn't make this stuff up!

One of mine was born on Christmas day. Lovely midwife with me all night and delivery was getting close that morning and she apologised for leaving me but her kids were at home waiting for her. When she was coming on shift the next night she came to see me before her shift started, wanted to give baby a cuddle and check how I was, she'd read my notes and knew how things had gone, not well really as things suddenly went downhill and I had an emergency C-section. I think she felt she'd have managed it better but who knows? Either way I wouldn't have wanted her to give up christmas with her own young children

Which staff in attendance? Women in labour wards are attended to by many staff because labour doesn't fit into neat packets of time that fit shifts. Do you blame the doctor or midwife who couldn't leave another patient because they needed urgent help, the one who hadn't noticed a change in fetal heart beat and had gone home at the end of their shift, perhaps the one who'd called in sick at the last moment meaning there was insufficient staff to run safely. There's so many possible people to pick.
This attitude of "someone has to be blamed" runs deep in our society when perhaps people are doing their best to keep going because they are working in extremely stressful and difficult. environments. I don't think anyone goes to work intending to be negligent do they?
A major city hospital has to cancel operations in one of its theatres if heavy rain is forecast because sewage comes up through the sinks. You couldn't make this stuff up!

There is so much more to it than that ronib. You cite medical malpractice, which is a term only applying to doctors, and as well as other staff, system failures can relate to resource failures as well - in fact they usually do. If you were to read any of the reports into maternity units you would see the bigger picture. I’m not in any way trying to excuse failures, but there is no quick fix solution to these issues and just blaming doctors is not fair or appropriate.

But I didn’t say that it wasn’t a multi faceted system failure ….. Casdon . I am trying to understand how negligence occurs in a maternity delivery suite. The key players have to be the staff in attendance surely?

If you read it, it will improve your understanding ronib. Most clinical negligence is a multi faceted system failure, not wholly attributable to an individual doctor being incompetent. I’ve got an irrational fear of spiders, but I know it’s not evidence based.

No I didn’t say that I had read the Ockenden Report - I asked AI! Casdon I don’t think it would be entirely irrational to have a fear of doctors given my past medical experience… however leave that aside.

Is that the point, ronib. I thought you’d said you had read the Ockenden Report? I begin to think you must suffer from iatrophobia.

No doubt you would have to trawl through lots of reports and court cases to find the answer, ronib.

The point is Casdon exactly who is responsible for medical negligence? Is it the consultant obstetrician, resident doctor, midwife or the hospital administrator or politicians who refuse to fund maternity provision to a safe and appropriate level?

ronib

MaizieD £27 billion paid out however so assuming some kind of malpractice? Politicians do not deliver babies…..??

The amount paid out isn’t related to how serious clinical negligence was, but to the effect on the child, and the cost of lifetime care provision for those who were seriously disabled. So compensation may be sufficient for an average lifespan.

There's a shortage of obstetricians and midwives which affects the quality of the service. You can't cancel the delivery of a baby by putting it on a waiting list for a few extra weeks because you don't have sufficient staff or your neonatal nurse has called in sick. Neither can you separate the quality of our maternity services from the political decisions that have been made over the past years. A midwife or a doctor can only see one patient at a time and anyone who has had any experience of working on labour wards knows how busy they can be, you need staff available 24/7, 365 days a year and that's different to most areas of medicine except perhaps A&E (except you can keep patients in A&E waiting for hours if you triage them well). Is it any surprise that our maternity service has suffered so much?

1982 - a filthy hospital, no choice of where to go although we were in London with several hospitals around, staff more interested in chatting and going off for lunch than staying with a mother about to give birth, emergency button not working. Mother shouting but no-one came.

Luckily father arrived during his lunch-hour and delivered the baby, ensuring the cord was not around her neck.

Thankfully she is fine.

Two of mine were born in the mid 80’s. We had continuity of care from gp, consultant, midwife then health visitor, we had relaxation sessions at our GP surgery from people directly involved in our care and later the care of our babies. I agreed to demonstrate breast feeding with a twrenty month old toddler in support.
It feels like total luxury when compared to those babies as new mothers thirty/35 years later. My daughters both credit me as their emergency person when struggling with their babes

I’m shocked by how poor our maternity and post natal care is

MaizieD £27 billion paid out however so assuming some kind of malpractice? Politicians do not deliver babies…..??

Fine, ronib, but it isn't always medical malpractice that causes the failure.