Forum menu
This dispute is not about saving our NHS or patient safety. It is about pay and conditions. That is not to belittle the latter, [b]but merely to be factual.[/b]Equally there are serious issues concerning NHS and social care funding, and patient safety [b]which must be dealt with but cannot be resolved as a contractual issue.[/b]
[b]There are three options:[/b] the NHS and social care do less; match resources with demand through more taxation; or raise money from “co-payments” from patients.
[b]All are politically unpalatable, [/b]which is why two years ago in an independent report (One Person ,One Team, One System, which was adopted by the Labour Party as its policy) I urged a “national conversation” with citizens on the options on the scope and funding of health care. I repeat that call today. [b]The matter is urgent and the BMA’s strikes will simply make this financial position, and the consequences, worse.[/b]
As I sad before - its too important an issue to be left to politicians, doctors and their union. The can cant be kicked too much further as the bend in the road is fast approaching
@thm...did you feel it whistling passed you as you missed the point I was making..... 😀
No, sorry (but in fairness I didnt understand the second bit)
You beat me to my edit @tgm. The point I was trying to make (which was lost in me using the emotuve 'hyoocrites') is that the passion sadly is more political based rather than genuine care for the service towards the patients...and I think it is deeply wrong to vilify a whole section of the NHS because of these political arguments...
I am not commenting on whwther the strike is right or not...simply that the arguments are flawed and hypocritical...
Well I agree on the argument issue - hence my earlier comments that ALL parties should hang their heads in shame as they have ALL deliberately muddied the central issue(s)
Sadly, none of this is new where health is concerned
is that the passion sadly is more political based rather than genuine care for the service towards the patients...
There are some that argue this can be flipped and aimed at elements of the JDC as well as people attacking the juniors. It does seem to be a dispute that has a political flavour on both sides.
The level of escalation is a strategic mistake though - it will lose the support of many more juniors (both via safety concerns and loss of income), and the general public. I see the GMC has issued a warning to doctors thinking of taking part, which I would have thought could be a significant factor if any are wavering.
It will be interesting to see how many juniors choose to work rather than strike this time around. If support ebbs away it will be hard to sustain the actions until Christmas.
One down, three to go
Yes, wonder how important the GMC intervention was?
I don't think the GMC intervention will have much impact on doctors tbh, there's a lot of distrust and lack of confidence there already after they appointed one of Hunt's advisors as CEO. I think it's designed to influence public opinion not doctors.
[b]Slight resurrection but relevant:[/b]
jambalaya - Member
As I have posted before medical school is hugely over subscribed, there is a very long list of people who want to be Doctors and have the skills to do so but can't get a place to study.
Mr Hunt has announced a 25% increase in junior doctor places (from 6,000 to 7,500 a year) in an effort to ensure we still have [i]some[/i] doctors left after Brexit.
Worth reading the full article.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-37546360
Mr Hunt has announced a 25% increase in junior doctor places (from 6,000 to 7,500 a year) in an effort to ensure we still have some doctors left after Brexit.
Along with the proposal that they have to work 4 years in the NHS as payback for public funding of their clinical training. It might be better to try to retain them with the prospect of a better, more rewarding career in an adequately resourced NHS without the Hunt's imposition of deleterious working conditions.
Australians getting pissed off again with economic migrants from failing nations flooding their country
https://www.ft.com/content/38513e9a-a029-11e6-86d5-4e36b35c3550
I think a slow clap for jeremy hunt, is called for
There's an interesting quote in the FT piece from a UK trained medics now working in Australia which points to one of the core problems in the NHS - that of a culture which is resistant at nearly every level to any form of change or taking what works from abroad and implementing it here... the "not invented here" syndrome that also exists between individual trusts, let alone between the NHS and other health systems.
“I spent a decade working at a hospital in Adelaide and then went back to work in the NHS in Wales. I thought I could bring back some of the positives and techniques I’d learnt in Australia to the UK. But there was resistance from administrators, and the focus was on merely keeping our heads above water, rather than introducing newfangled systems and processes from the colonies."
and the focus was on merely keeping our heads above water
the size and scale of the top down reorganisation and cuts forced on the NHS this is hardly surprising
I thought I could bring back some of the positives and techniques I’d learnt in Australia to the UK
Pitty it doesn't actually state what they are. Our Trust is actively looking for changes that can improve patient experience/save money.
Unfortunately a lot of the government policies/financial constraints we are now under prevent us from doing anything that would add value.
the size and scale of the top down reorganisation and cuts forced on the NHS this is hardly surprising
Equally you could say that the failure of the NHS to reform itself over many decades is precisely the reason that a "top down" change is now being prescribed - it's finally reached a demographic tipping point where it must now change, or fail ..and at scale. And surely that's not what anyone wants.
If we take a system view, Primary Care has been broken for a decade or more because the bulk of the funding still goes on maintaining a footprint of hospitals that was designed on a reasonably arbitrary basis back in the 1940s / 50s.
The view of what Primary Care should / shouldn't also hasn't really evolved in 3 decades despite the many advances in diagnostics and treatment - so we still have many thousands of single handed GP practices running even though we know they are significantly more likely to lead to poor care / outcomes.
The country has changed immeasurably since the NHS was originally conceived but the system has barely changed and continues to operate the pointless delineations between primary and secondary care that many other health systems have long since moved on from.
We now have one of the most obese and unhealthy societies in the western world and yet the NHS operating model is still focused on treating sickness not maintaining wellness. We're on track to spend 10% of the entire NHS budget on type 2 diabetes / comorbidities but we're still debating whether it's ok for GPs to tell obese patients they must lose weight.
We now have one of the most obese and unhealthy societies in the western world and yet the NHS operating model is still focused on treating sickness not maintaining wellness.
Indeed , however public health is now the responsibility of Local Councils
https://www.theguardian.com/local-government-network/2013/apr/18/council-public-health-responsibilities
who have also seen huge cuts to funding.....
We now have one of the most obese and unhealthy societies in the western world and yet the NHS operating model is still focused on treating sickness not maintaining wellness.
This quote aside, you are good at following the government sound bites, in fact are you Jeremy Hunt?
Massive amounts of work has been done trying to try and get healthier lifestyles and prevent the onset obesity/diabetes etc. Unfortunately the fact is, people like eating kebabs, drinking, smoking,and eating sugar etc. Oh and riding mountain bikes - (a big user of acute care.)
the system has barely changed and continues to operate the pointless delineations between primary and secondary care that many other health systems have long since moved on from.
Again massive amounts of work has been done to try and resolve this. The fact is that there isn't enough money in the whole system ie Acute Care, Primary Care, Public Health, Social Care. This magical government view of we can take funding from Acute care to social/care closer to home is bollox. There is simply too much activity that requires acute care to take that funding out.
Oh Google Vanguard. The government promised millions of extra cash to support making changes to the whole Acute Care, Primary Care, Public Health, Social Care system, and work has been done to get it all in place, only now for the government to revoke the funding.
Again I can see how you could potentially, maybe, somehow think it is the workers fault and not government policy 🙄
The government have also failed repeatedly to legislate against unhealthy foods and lig=festyles
obesity cost and kills more than smoking yet the government have rolled over to industry lobbying on minimum alcohol pricing, traffic light labeling for food etc
lets be honest tho theres one massive reason for the surge in jr doctors heading to Australia the last 2 years
[img] 
[/img]
According to a colleague who did just that he said that while they are clamping down on docs at jr level, because 4 years ago they doubled the intake at medical school by subsidising tuition fees, that has yet to filter through so there is still a big shortage at consultant level, when is Hunt planning to change their contracts?
Massive amounts of work has been done trying to try and get healthier lifestyles and prevent the onset obesity/diabetes etc. Unfortunately the fact is, people like eating kebabs, drinking, smoking,and eating sugar etc.
From that Grauniad link - "Doctors are notoriously nervous of telling people they are overweight.." Seriously? Don't know if I've ever met a doctor who has displayed any kind of anxiety about calling a spade a spade.
Kimbers. He's wrong. 6300 entrants in 2004. Not much increase since. JH is talking about going up to 7500.
stoatsbrother
that was in Australia, not here, my ex-colleague moved out to sydney this summer
Just 5 mins - in my 30 odd years of working in the NHS I have lost count of the number of reforms and reorganisations that have been done all politically motivated and all making things worse
Simple solution - keep governments out of the bloody way
Junior doctors have lifted all threat of strike action and pledged to work with the Government to help introduce a controversial new contract.