A bloody good question too!
I often have wondered why I am doing it with no training and initially
little interest.
There are 2 components to it.
1/Administrative stuff that any trained monkey can do.As soon as I am able
to employ one ,stuff like rosters,requisitions etc will be
turfed.(unfortunately i can't seem to convince anyone that peanuts added to
my budget will receive a bigger return)
2/ Other managerial stuff that you do need some background in Emergency
Medicine for.
Strategic planning(short and long term) and operational planning does
need someone with appropriate experience.This is the stuff that
entire courses at extremely inflated prices are composed of!(witness recent
threads here) I did a management for clinicians course for a week that cost
3500 dollars(excluding transport accomodation and beer!)
Professional colleagues unfortunately will not take your department
seriously if they do not see someone they regard as an equal across the
table. A professional administrator or manager will not be able to argue the
case with a surgeon as to why you need to send a patient to the ward without
the endless rigamarole associated with junior staff.
By all means get rid of as much administrative stuff as you can. I now have
a roster template(not as good as John Chambers automated web based roster
but I'm getting there),which you either fit into or arrange your own swaps.
I'm almost at the point where i don't do simple data entry for higher up and
I am trying to get rid of more.
But if you do not interact with other colleagues on what they perceive to be
an equal level then you will achieve nothing.And isn't that what you want?
To be perceived as a specialty deserving of respect the same as other
specialists?
Shane
-----Original Message-----
From: Howard Simpson <[log in to unmask]>
To: [log in to unmask] <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Wednesday, 9 August 2000 11:10
Subject: RE: non academic stuff
A genuine question here. Why does it have to be the consultant who fields
the paperwork / does rotas / goes to meetings to defend their turf? Has
anyone ever appointed a proper manager (ie someone with a proven track
record in industry, not just worked up the closed shop ranks of the NHS,
although I realise the 2 are not mutually exclusive) to manage their
department and leave the skilled, trained consultants to see patients like
only they can? After all, the best teachers aren't always the best head
teachers. The best engineers aren't always the best production managers. The
best athletes aren't always the best tour managers. Surely the best doctors
don't always become the best heads of department, so maybe we need to
rethink radically how best to organise ourselves. It can't be any less
radical than the way some of the politicians are thinking for us.
Howard Simpson
-----Original Message-----
From: Shane Curran [SMTP:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: 09 August 2000 13:32
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: non academic stuff
<< File: ATT00010.htm >> Lets get some of this straight.
A short proviso
I am one of those guys who spends half of his time in the office doing that
admin stuff.
I don't particularly want to and have much more fun on the floor where i
think i may do some good,both as far as patient care goes and supervision
and teaching of junior staff and students both medical and nursing.
HOWEVER,a department that is not administratively strong will get nowhere!
If there isn't someone polishing a chair with their backside ,then the
department will continue to function at a low level.
Policies do not magically appear,rosters do not appear as if by
magic.Proactive behaviour against admin low blows is not sexy but is needed.
If you are not at a lot of meetings building your power base then your
department will get screwed and left with everything that other people don't
want(telephone advice lines for one!)
However the visible face for most interactions worth other specialist
colleagues is by seeing patients at ungodly hours.Until my colleague and i
chose career longevity over patient service and gave up shiftwork we would
ring people up and they would do stuff.Its a bit hard for a registrar to
knock back a request when he knows you'll just ring his/her boss!
Until you get enough consultants for 1 person to sit in the office and
drive the great paperwork juggernaut to the departments advantage and then
enough consultants to cover the floor then you will have arguments like
"there are too many consultants who sit in their office".
But next time think to yourself before saying it "has it worked to my
advantage?"
They may be the reason that emergency medicine(none of this stupid accident
stuff!) is where it is in your hospital by continually battering down doors
with a small forest of dead trees!
Shane
(who proved the worth of Emergency Physicians by diagnosing by the end of
the intern presentation what was wrong with the guy who bounced back the day
after he had been discharged from the surgical ward after a week of masterly
tests but no diagnosis!!)
Shane Curran
Emergency Department
wagga Wagga Base Hospital
Wagga Wagga
NSW 2650
And Cliff
Heretics are welcome in my department!
Your allowed to say anything you want provided you can back it up logically!
Just quote Emergency Physician vacancy # 545!
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