When I was a final year medical student I did my elective at the Institute of Occupational Health on the top floor of the School of Tropical Medicine in Gower Street, London. Lovely Unit funded by the TUC, I suspect probably closed now by Tomlinson, Thatcher et al.
They were doing research into the epidemic of MI's on the London river pilots. Found the cause was that they had no warning and were stressed out. Came on duty didn't know if had to pilot a 500,000 ton super tanker up the estuary and so it went on. Lessons I learned 30 years ago and things have not progressed only got worse. It is the lack of control and pre-warning.
Same in NHS all same features causing stress. Poor communication between administration and doers. Lack of appreciation, no control of work load which can be intolerable. Inability to have influence over work environment, ie trolleys all over the place. This is what causes burnout and sickness in the profession. I include nurses paramedics and docs in this list. Staff causght like rats on a wheel running faster and faster.
My great mentor the late Tony Cross, A&E consultant in B'ham got very upset about the situation in his dept. trolleys all over the place, lack of beds. He cared and I have no doubt it killed him. A man who after working for 40 years should now have been in retirement.
In the modern NHS we have a****les who are obsessed with targets and stastitics who are flogging the workforce to death and mental illness. One only has to look at the edicts that are coming out from the DoH every day. The instigators have no concept of the pressures on the workforce who actually care for their patients. Although there was a survey by the association a few years ago I have not seen any real efforts to improve the lot of the staff as usual a lot of talk but little else.
I have never seen such a barrier between the administration and the doers in the NHS in my 30 years. Our hospital has apparently been found to be the most overmanaged in the country. We never see them, very similar to the generals in WW1 who sent the troops over the top and it led to shell shock.
I apologise to the list that this posting is not acaedemic enough. However after leaving the dept. at 2.00 am and getting up at 8.00am to go back in a few hours I have not had time to go to medline to research it properly, unlike some of the so-called quasi acaedemics who are hell bent at telling us what to do or driving us to an early grave or the nut house for their own personal edification, as well as sitting in their comfy offices distanced from drunks, trolleys and abusive patients.
Danny McGeehan
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