My payslip as a doctor in Feb 2021 during COVID

[Juniordoc]

See attached image. Yes this is for full-time work with weekends and nights in the currently stretched working conditions that the NHS provides.

This does not include the expenses and sacrifices of a six year medical degree. On top of that, we have to pay out of pocket for our own GMC membership, medical defence union, postgrad exams and revision courses, conferences and courses.

Please get behind us and support the strikes. We are burnout, exhausted and struggling to live

I’ve got a family member who was a junior doctor about 25 years ago. They did 60-80 hours and were paid the same hourly rate as a hospital porter
😱

I did sign up for crap conditions, and knew the conditions would be crap - but you're wrong to think I was happy to stay in crap conditions. In fact, I gave up work 20 years ago and have been a SAHP ever since.

I am fortunate to have had that option. However, my good fortune in that regard changes nothing about my views regarding the effect that the doctors' strikes will likely have on the NHS (namely that they will hasten its demise).

I do feel, very much, for the patients who are the playthings of the government and the unions, particularly this week. But my view is a rather longer one - partly as a result of these strikes, there will probably be a very long and painful period for all patients (other than those who can afford to 'go private', or who are so desperate that they will take out loans, cash in pensions etc) while the NHS implodes and something else emerges from its ashes.

A trainee doctor is any doctor that’s not a consultant, it doesn’t just refer to doctors who’ve recently qualified.

and are you FY1? Because pay progression is quite good. Your salary will go up a lot in the next couple years. 35% is ridiculous. LOTS of people worked during the pandemic including myself and my partner.

So you gave up work because you weren't prepared to put up with 'crap conditions' and have subsequently stayed at home for 20 years. However, you freely judge people who are left with no option but to strike for decent conditions. Don't you find that a bit hypocritical?

I'm a qualified nurse, fully support the strikes. I see and hear and feel what our trainee doctors go through. It wouldn't be expected or tolerated in any other profession.

NHS nurse here, I support you!

Hi, you seem to have missed my point. I didn't say grades are being reduced. I said doctors are leaving in droves. Medicine has historically been oversubscribed by intelligent applicants. Of course some bright 17/18 year olds may still wish to pursue medicine at university. But have you spoken to current medical students? Some don't even want to take up a post in the UK, many want to complete their foundation training then emigrate abroad.

My point was, what do we do when all the doctors leave? Do we reduce entry requirements?
I am one of the few that has stuck around (for now). Morale is low. My juniors are miserable. My consultants aren't exactly happy either. It feels like endless hoop jumping, for what? I certainly wouldnt encourage this lifestyle to anyone that seeks careers advice. Peers who didnt get the grades for medical school from my cohort went to to study Biochemistry, Pharmacology, Chemistry (all of whom I am still friends with). They all outearn me now and for a much better quality of life. Yes they were initially disappointed not to go to medical school/become a doctor, but are all now happy with families etc. Whereas I not only earn less, have missed weddings (due to on calls), haven't started a family yet, still studying etc.

Yes, this year we had medical students graduate as doctors yet no place for them to start their postgraduation training and working as a doctor.

Yet we are so short of doctors.

Why? There are no seniors to support their training.
Junior doctors get very little training, it is largely service provision. Have you ever been to A&E? It just takes 1 visit to any department anywhere in the country to realise how much "training" is happening and how much is service provision.

So we need more senior doctors. But how? The ones trained here are leaving. The ones we'd usually recruit from abroad don't want to come.

Doctors are very employable the world over. Doctors are also very employable in other industries. Doctors are finite. Why would a doctor want to work for £15/hour for the responsibility at stake? Why is decades of training at such a difficult level so undervalued?

It's really not a surprise that people are leaving.

In my personal experience - the consultants are counting down time till (early) retirement. Medical students cant wait for their "F3" and don't return. The junior juniors want to get on to a training programme of their choice in a locality of their choice, if they dont get this they locum/travel/work abroad and don't return. Us senior juniors are the awkward ones. Many have families, mortgages etc can't just disappear off to Aus. For now, I'm counting down the time till I CCT as a consultant while also studying for and paying for my expensive postgraduate exams, not to mention working in a broken system. Who knows what post CCT life will bring. I didnt do the F3 dream. I will probably do a fellowship abroad (/possibly not return). Here lies the problem, the cycle of losing staff. Staying in the UK and working in the NHS is not attractive, it is literally the opposite. Why should I spend my entire working career in these conditions? I've done it for long enough.

Regardless of whether I stay or go, I sincerely hope things improve so that NHS doctors have less miserable working conditions and can provide better patient care. This is what the strike is about.

Were you unaware of the salary when you chose this profession?

@23holia sorry I misunderstood your point. My DD is going into 4th year at med school. She doesn't want to leave and go abroad but I ask myself how she will feel a few years down the line. I have a younger DC who is in the first year of A Levels and is on track for four A stars. He wants to study medicine and intends doing the UCAT this summer. I am trying hard to dissuade him whilst respecting that it is his decision. I am trying to get him to consider either straight Chemistry or Biochemistry instead. I think it would be a more sensible choice the way things are right now.

How hard is it to understand that there has been a 30% salary erosion in real terms since 2008? The real salary has diminished significantly. They are only asking to get back to where they were 15 years ago.

Or that first year doctors today are taking home the same as I did 20 years ago. Without the benefit of free accommodation.

CriticalAlert
I honestly do think that a 35% pay rise is ridiculous I do think that they deserve a rise in pay and I do think they are worth every penny they get but if they were to get a 35% rise other workers in this country would have to pay for that pay rise through the tax rise the government would bring in and then families would suffer as the cost of living would go up .
My nephew is a fully qualified Doctor who works in A & E so I do know how junior drs are paid and how over worked they are but I also know that it does get better and their payslips get a lot bigger and I also know being a Dr is not something that you go into for the money you have to want to help people and these strikes are not helping people as people have died because of these strikes , and yes this is true as it was said on the news today, so how many more patients do they want to die before they accept the deal the gov is offering.

This entire post has been an eye opener for a parent of a ds about to start med school. Place offered, currently on year out. He’s also got an offer for Medical Sciences and Biomed.

I’ve just sent your comment to him.

Another one bites the dust…..potentially.

Let’s hope Govn changes their destructive attitude.

No. I gave up work because I wanted to be at home with my children. It so happens that I also gave up a job with crap conditions. However, if I'd been brilliantly well paid and had had the very best conditions, I'd still have given up work because it simply ceased to matter to me after I had my first child, and I could afford to make that choice.

If I hadn't been able to afford to make that choice, I'd have either stayed with the less than ideal conditions and pay, or I'd have looked into alternatives. Striking was never going to be an option for me, because in the end, the only people who are affected by strikes are those who shouldn't be.

Reading this thread, the anti-junior doctor posts can be summarised as:

1. it's shit but you knew it would be shit
   Considering medical school is at least 5 years for an undergraduate, often 6, it was much better in terms of relative pay when current junior doctors enrolled as medical students. Don't forget that many 'junior' doctors are 10+ years post graduation, so chose to become doctors 15+ years ago. Pay was 35% better than it is today in relative terms and all F1s got free accomodation. Many junior doctors have published their pay slips as newly qualified doctors from 10-25 years ago, and the pay is identical to what it is now. Housing and other costs of living were a fraction of what they are now.

2. it's shit but others have it worse
   It's not a race to the bottom. Moreover, paying well below global market rates is resulting in the UK heamorrhaging doctors as they go abroad.

3. you shouldn't be a junior doctor for the money
   Absolutely, no one chose to be a doctor for the pay, there are many better paid careers. But a sense of vocation or claps won't pay mortgages, rent, childcare or other bills.

4. The public will suffer during the strikes
   Possibly yes, though the consultant body has agreed to provide cover. However, patients are already suffering due to the chronic and worsening staff shortages in the NHS, due to worsening relative pay and conditions. Not addressing this, by pay restoration, will result in the NHS staff shortages worsening. Retention is needed for patient safety.

Have I missed anything?

Yes you missed the bit where they are juniors, supervised in what is a training role and they don't make any important decisions without consultation with senior Drs.

Their clinical skills are on par with many senior nurses particularly advanced nurse practitioners.

It is a starting salary. The pay progression is vast and when they are Consultants and actually responsible for life or death decisions they'll be raking it in.

Housing and costs of living are the same for everyone and most people have not had pay rises anything like 35%, most people earn a lot less than doctors over their career.

Yes, I did miss that amongst all the posts. It's been stated many times that the supervision is minimal, due to senior staff shortages, and training minimal too due to the above. Junior doctors mainly give service provision.

The role of a doctor and a nurse are very different. Both are important. I'm not going to demean other healthcare professionals. It is a complete oversimplification to say that doctors skills are the same as nurses, the roles are very different, and excellent nurses, even nurse practitioners, do not negate the need for doctors.

It's also been addressed that the pay progression is poor until becoming a consultant. Many will not become consultants either, and bills need to be paid currently, they can't be deferred.

Yet you still think you are well placed to judge, having no appreciation of what it is like to be a junior doctor trying to juggle ridiculous conditions with family life. For some it is a real vocation and they care too much to train for years and run away from it. And also you have no idea what you would have done if you’d been pushed to the brink in your teaching job, had you decided to stay in the workplace.

Covered in points one and two. Few professions can claim that their pay has remained identical in absolute terms over the past 15+ years. For many, the pay has kept up with the cost of living (MPs being one example).

It's not a race to the bottom moreover, and others can and should also take industrial action if in similar circumstances.

Erm…..
It has been declared people on benefits should get the same as doctors.
Good luck with that one 🤣🤣

Unless you want to go and live in a Communist country, people are generally rewarded for their education level, skills and the specialist contribution they can make to society through this. Deal with it.

I think there are quite a few people on here who think this is a communist country.
Either that or they’re trusting their medical needs on witch doctors