NHS doctors’ strike is ‘inevitable,’ says new BMA chair

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It could be made less stressful with better less unwieldy IT support, more admin support, better signposting of patients and other sectors including social care and secondary care able to also function more effectively. Ultimately better patient education as to which problems need a GP and when this is urgent and when other services ranging from 999 to social services to informal/ voluntary sector and support from family and friends is more approprate. Hell I just remembered 999 needs to be able to function which means ambulances need to be able to offload which needs social services need to be able to function. Utimately more appointments are needed and quite probably more hours worked by GPs doing clinically relevent work and not being bogged down by nonsense. Which means more other staff so that it is safe for them to see patients and an end to the " 5 o'clock " - for some services( or even 5:30 or 6:30) -6:30 for all other staff to leave-phenomenon which means that if it is still appropriate for you to offer an appointment that day rather than direct to A and E there will be someone in the building with you in case they do become agitated/ agressive or an emergency develops for which you need assistance, or contacting ambulance service, sending urgent fax ( if not in England) etc Plus pharmacies to still be open and mental health services to be contactable in the event of the patient having a mental health crisis
And lots and lots of coffee
 
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Unfortunately the NHS is in an unstoppable downward spiral. If it was an animal, I'm not sure at what point it should be allowed to pass over the rainbow bridge. That day is coming.
 
Benny G said:
View attachment 21525

So, 12% of GPs working full time, perhaps the money is not so important to the part timers, or else they would work more hours and put in a full week.

Yes, the figures are from before the government's lock downs.

Click to expand...

This isn't actually true for all NHS doctors.
(Including GP's I know that do private surgeries)
This is the number of hours they are working on contract to the NHS.

Not the number of hours the NHS pay them for.
Most of the senior doctors and consultants at our local NHS hospitals work part time.
But only because they work at a local private hospital on other days.
So, you can jump the queue, see the consultants privately, then they will put you in the NHS system, - jumping the queue.
Or, the local NHS will refer patients to the private clinic, paying the consultants the fees for them, (subcontracted NHS work), and then the consultant will mix continued care at the private clinic, and in NHS hospitals, in a mix of NHS and private work, but all paid by the NHS.
Obviously if they worked full time NHS, they couldn't do this.
So, a very nice little scheme, to get paid private rates by the NHS.
Possibly considering exclusive NHS contracts would focus them more?
 
travellor said:
This isn't actually true for all NHS doctors.
(Including GP's I know that do private surgeries)
This is the number of hours they are working on contract to the NHS.

Not the number of hours the NHS pay them for.
Most of the senior doctors and consultants at our local NHS hospitals work part time.
But only because they work at a local private hospital on other days.
So, you can jump the queue, see the consultants privately, then they will put you in the NHS system, - jumping the queue.
Or, the local NHS will refer patients to the private clinic, paying the consultants the fees for them, (subcontracted NHS work), and then the consultant will mix continued care at the private clinic, and in NHS hospitals, in a mix of NHS and private work, but all paid by the NHS.
Obviously if they worked full time NHS, they couldn't do this.
So, a very nice little scheme, to get paid private rates by the NHS.
Possibly considering exclusive NHS contracts would focus them more?
Click to expand...
Or they could follow the money, and do even less 'NHS GP' hours and more private hours.

Zero hours contracts for NHS opens a whole other tin of worms.
 
Benny G said:
Or they could follow the money, and do even less 'NHS GP' hours and more private hours.

Zero hours contracts for NHS opens a whole other tin of worms.
Click to expand...

Easy answer.
Contract them in at the start of training.
We pay for their training for several years after they start in the NHS until they are actually "qualified," contract them for a substantial exclusive period after they qualify.
If they leave before the contract is up, they pay it back.
Most other jobs do it.
 
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Students go to medical school at 18 years old when they have no life experience and no idea of the reality of the work and dedication required when studying medicine most of them have no experience of dealing with people who are severely unwell and it is a shock. They don't get the long holidays like other students who can get summer jobs. Many think that once they get their qualification, that is the end of the learning which cannot be further from the truth, it is a continuous process for the rest of their career.
My daughter is a glutton for punishment but doing a nursing degree and a chiropractic degree before going to med school better prepared her for the reality of the situation. But even then she needed further study to get her membership of the Royal College of Obs and Gynae.
To fit family life into the schedule of a hospital doctor is difficult and her husband became a GP as both of them trying to work hospital schedules was impossible as shifts were allocated but even as a GP the workload is huge but the hours more regular.
They both work on admin nearly every evening when the kids have gone to bed.
The so called Agenda for Change in the NHS seems to have had little impact on the job satisfaction of staff or monetary reward. For years it had relied on the good will and commitment that most NHS staff have.
 
While I agree about your comments about two doctors married, it's nothing new. I made a sensible decision not to associate with other female medical students to avoid that situation arising (I married a historian). But i don't recognise the lack of summer holidays while i was a student. The first couple of years are entirely non clinical learning anatomy, physiology, and pathology, plus pharmacy. Normal University terms. And long holidays, giving me the time to learn how to work in a factory, mix with normal people, learned how to chrome plate and nickel plate bits and pieces, learned wood machining and and how to make dry dog food. And in one Easter break how to build deer fences in Dumfries and Newton Stewart region.

All those jobs has helped me become the person I am, and none of them are medical in nature. I can talk to anybody as an equal.

But in my day, as a junior doctor, I was on call every third day,and third weekend. That is staying at the hospital, which in those days had bedrooms for the doctors. Nonetheless, that could involve driving to the hospital on a Friday morning, dong a days work then starting a weekend on call, then a normal day working on the Monday before driving home. Without a single night of unbroken sleep. That no longer applies. GPs don't do their own home visits during the night, that's all handed over to the on call system, so patients don't see their own doctor at night, who has no access to their history.

And no GP should be dong admin work at night. The trick is to get a competent practice manager, who governs the admin work and staffing, but that costs money, meaning a reduction in their take home pay. It's the whole practice that gets the money, how it is distributed is the choice of the GPs.
 
"GPs saw their earnings rise to £142,000 during the pandemic in a Covid pay boom, new data show.

The official NHS figures reveal that as surgeries closed their doors to patients, routinely restricting face-to-face appointments, doctors’ incomes rose to unprecedented heights.

GP partners – who make up the majority of family doctors – saw average incomes rise by £20,000 to £142,000 in the 12 months after the first lockdown."

Not a bad salary really.
For a 3 day week.
Puts a merchant banker to shame.
(Maybe they'll retrain?)

But at least GP's won't have to worry over energy bills.


www.telegraph.co.uk

GPs given record pay rises in Covid pandemic

Wages hit a ‘difficult to justify’ level of £142,000 as patients were turned away from surgeries
www.telegraph.co.uk www.telegraph.co.uk
 
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Benny G said:
View attachment 21525

So, 12% of GPs working full time, perhaps the money is not so important to the part timers, or else they would work more hours and put in a full week.

Yes, the figures are from before the government's lock downs.

Click to expand...
I've just noticed this post. Most GPs are not salaried, they are self employed, They pay salaried GPs out of the money received by the practice - in other words, out of their own potential income. They are often female GPs who are starting families. But nothing in that report can tell you how may hours a normal GP works. It only tells you how may hours salaried GPs work.

You certainly can't make the comment that only 12% of GPs are working full time, that only refers to salaried GPs. The vast majority of GPs work full time.
 
mikeyB said:
I've just noticed this post. Most GPs are not salaried, they are self employed, They pay salaried GPs out of the money received by the practice - in other words, out of their own potential income. They are often female GPs who are starting families. But nothing in that report can tell you how may hours a normal GP works. It only tells you how may hours salaried GPs work.

You certainly can't make the comment that only 12% of GPs are working full time, that only refers to salaried GPs. The vast majority of GPs work full time.
Click to expand...

No, the report is the number of hours they are on contract to the NHS for.
They certainly do not contract to the NHS even vaguely approaching full time.
 
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