This is going to hurt

travelsafar BBC1 starts Tuesday 8th February at 9pm.

janeainsworth

And perhaps earlier generations of doctors should have called out the tyranny of the system so that so many doctors wouldn’t suffer burn out.
‘Well that’s what our generation put up with and now we’re laughing because young people are suffering in the same way we did’ - is that what you’re saying Kali2?

As daughter of matron ,seniors took great delight in bragging how many hours they did and how many near misses they had too!! And lambasted juniors saying "we did it why shouldn't they?" Stupid attitude and extremely perilous for poor patients who got the doc on his or her last knockings! Ridiculous ethos all about one upmanship and zeros out The actual patients!

I think you have to be really tough to be a doctor- my son who is now a senior consultant surgeon, loved his time as a junior doctor - just as described by Kali - particularly in A&E - it gave him an adrenalin rush I think- yes, he got exhausted - But ended up winning prizes and a first class degree- he is dedicated, clever, tough and loves his job - hospital politics aside - of course- like the politics in any place of work. ??

Loved the books, and we went to see him too. Looking forward to this, and hoping the transfer to the screen will be successful - sometimes it isn't.

I read the book, not sure to laugh or weep, especially laugh at some peoples dilemmas that they get themselves into. I can imagine that humour is the one channel of release for the stress that goes on in these careers. I don’t wish this on anyone. The NHS is just not valued enough, and the way that it is going, privatisation, is on the increase. Let’s hope that we don’t end up like USA.

I absolutely LOVED every single one of his books. I hope the television programme does those books justice

'Breaking and Mending' by Joanna Cannon is well worth a read. She's a doctor too but no longer practises for reasons that become obvious on reading her book. She's written several others too but that one is her personal experience.

which channel is this on please?

The book is comedic but also a rare insight into the awful reality of hospital life and death. I hope the TV series will reflect that.

Is it any wonder some of our hospitals are prone to miss diagnosis.

I have also read the book and looking forward to the t.v. Adaptation..

I found this book funny too, that is no surprise when you find that the author Adam Kay is now ....a comedian and comedy writer. google him. he wrote the book with humour in mind!

...Adam Richard Kay (born 12 June 1980) is a British comedy writer, author, comedian and former doctor. His television writing credits include Crims, Mrs. Brown's Boys and Mitchell and Webb. He is best known as author of the number-one bestselling book 'This Is Going to Hurt.'

Yes, I remember that, Wheniwasyourage

I think all the GPs in our practice are part-time, male and female. It works well with childcare, I think!

Yes, Callistemon, that was a help. The only problem was that although everyone knew it was coming and that it would mean that nobody would have to work these silly hours, the powers-that-were didn't think through the implications for numbers of doctors needed - obviously more to cover the hours. There was no substantial increase in medical school places, so there was a shortage of doctors.

Add in the fact that medical schools started admitting students on academic results without the old proportions of male to female, and there was no increase in places then either. By the rules of human biology, many of the more than half of newly-qualified doctors who were female were going to want time off to have babies, and then, in a lot of cases, want to work part-time. Of course, when the women wanted to work part-time, a lot of the men thought that it would be a good idea for them too. Now we have a severe shortage of doctors, not helped by Brexit, and it will take years to get the numbers back up, even if they started today to increase medical school places.

You couldn't make it up, as they say!

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Didn't it change with the introduction of the EWTD AKA the WTR (Working Time Regulations) in the UK?

Certainly hope so. And yet, must be hard for doctors who took it as par for the course to work 130+ hours- to have youngsters complaining now about 70 hrs per week. Or those complaining now as young GP trainees who do more or less 8 hrs day, with NO on-call at night, NO home visits and NO week-ends- when they themselves had to do all the above for 30 years.

Yes, sorry, I don't think I was clear. I didn't mean that we didn't get that sort of thing said to us, as we did, but that I would hope that we wouldn't say it to young ones now.

Indeed, exactly.

As for the idea of saying "we did it so the younger ones can do it too", that is offensive, as nobody sane would wish that on anyone else.

Those are more or less the exact words used by a Consultant when my friend's daughter and other junior doctors complained about the hours when they were so fatigued it was difficult to function.

wheniwasyourage As for the idea of saying "we did it so the younger ones can do it too", that is offensive, as nobody sane would wish that on anyone else
Just to be clear, I didn’t actually say that was my opinion.
But I’ve heard that view expressed many times and I’ve seen it on Gransnet too, and that seemed to be what kali2 was implying by saying she found Adam Kay’s account of his life as a junior doctor funny.

I also wasn’t suggesting that doctors working at the coalface of medicine were in a position to do much about their working conditions.
But their union representatives at the BMA and the leaders of the profession at the Royal Colleges could have.

Wheniwasyourage

Perhaps if you have lived it, you find it funny just because you know what it's about and just how hard it was. Anyway, it is a very funny book because he is good at writing in a way that makes things funny. That is why it appeals to people who have never lived through the experience as well, of course.

Absolutely - yes, it graphically illustrates the pressures faced by all our NHS staff in the present climate, but it has some real laugh-out-loud moments in there too. In all the emergency services, I'm sure there are times when, if they didn't laugh, they'd cry.

Perhaps if you have lived it, you find it funny just because you know what it's about and just how hard it was. Anyway, it is a very funny book because he is good at writing in a way that makes things funny. That is why it appeals to people who have never lived through the experience as well, of course.

janeainsworth

Kali2 I’m just struggling to understand why, if your husband suffered so much while he worked as a junior doctor, you found Adam Kay’s book funny.
To me it was a story of the gradual breakdown of a dedicated young man who had no choice but to leave the profession he loved and to which he had dedicated over 10 years of his life.

I know, it does seem perverse, and I think you have to have 'lived it' to understand. Could never understand those who glorified the war years and said it was the 'best years of their life' considering how many friends they losts or saw crippled so badly, physically and mentally.

But in a way, for the doctors in those times, if they survived, it is a bit the same. Junior Doctors all lived together at the hospital- some permanently, others had other homes and had to live there when on call- as said, 1 night in 2 or 3 on top of the very full day, + weekends. They shared the Mess, talked, played bridge or whatever, always one person or two ready to take the hand as the bleeper called. It was a bit like being at boarding school. Ate there together too. They shared stories, joys and disasters- and the friendships made then, on job rotations that lasted 3 years - endured forever. It's difficult to explain. And if you did survive, then you look back in horror, but also with humour- at those bygone days.

But yes, some were broken by it all, physically and mentally- and went into research, pharmacology, etc- as they could not take the stress and or the hours, the sleepless nights when you then had to go on to do a full day on top. It impossible to describe just how bad it was. And yes, dark humour was the best survival technique.

The he hospital where he was SHO changed from 1 in 2, to 1 in 3- to avoid paying overtime.