Well, its that time of year again when our business plan is looked at and our request for 'Way Ahead 2005' levels of staffing are looked at by managers with open mouths and closed wallets!
The question I have difficulty answering (among many others) is would we be able to fill the middle grade tier if there was the significant expansion we require made? In all honesty I don't think we could, and even if WE did, what about all the other hospitals that need to expand that tier, there just aren't't enough to go around.
If that is the case, how can our leaders continue to put forward this model of medical staffing, shouldn't we be trying, as a specialty, to come up with a more realistic/realisable pattern of staffing.
We will have to make more use of extended nursing roles, other specialty teams, hospital at night etc or see a SIGNIFICANT drop in attendances if we are ever going to get on top of this problem. In any case, proper supervision by well trained specialists is a must but we certainly won't have enough of them to go around either!!
Simon McCormick
(Expecting to be called on a number of occasions over the next four days/nights because the A&E patients have waited 2 hours to be seen, despite the fact they know I'm not coming in to sort that problem out!)
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