to ask this question about NHS

[sunshinecity17]

why do we have so many foreign doctors in the NHS?
There is no shortage of bright British kids wanting to go to medical school.Even if the full cost of educating them was born by the students, i am sure they could fill the medical schools.I used to work in a University medical school (15 years ago!) and the majority of students seemed to be from overseas..

my only issue is the consultation time goes up because i can't always understand them they cant understand me then there is the prescription problems twice recently an out of hours doctor has given me meds for my son that are above our guidelines but not above the ones in his home country

im made to feel like a foreigner in my own country if i wanted to feel foreign i would move to another country

Because it's much cheaper for the british government to let another country pay for their education.
We then get all their tax.
No brainer .

revolutionary I was JOKING read my subsequent posts.

So are Overseas doctors on different terms and conditions to Uk doctors?

Some are. If you look at a name badge and it says 'Dr X, honorary consultant' they are being paid £0 by the NHS.

They will be from a developing country, a lot seem to be from Sri Lanka, and are paid by their own government to work in the NHS for free for a few years to gain experience.

Working in the NHS is actually highly unattractive if there is no chance of career progression to consultancy, so your vision of all these British graduates happy to work for 30 plus years stuck at the same level (middle grade) is unlikely to materialise. Many would sooner jump ship and move to Australia/ New Zealand / U.S.A./Canada where either the quality of life for medics is better or the financial renumeration is better or both. Many already have because even consultancy in the NHS is not what it once was.

If you have worked in a University medical school you should have known that med schools have a maximum quota of 10-15% overseas students that they can enrol.

We have so many overseas doctors simply because we cannot staff on call rotas safely without them. Not enough UK graduates are applying for even training posts these days (and I have experience of this having sat on interview panels).

The NHS would have collapsed in the last 50 years without foreign graduates. It is in danger of collapse now even with them. Far fewer UK graduates than before want UK training posts becuase it is a thankless task. If you dare to work as a doctor the media blast you as being greedy, work shy and overpaid, when the reality is the exact opposite. The NHS trusts treat you as free labour and your career prospects are significantly affected if you dare to do anything like having a family.

Just be sure, if it weren't for foreign graduates, the NHS wouldn't function.

Why should it matter? And you'd be surprised by how few kids want to be doctors these days - we get plenty of work experience students who realise within a week that it's not for them.

It is also absolutely not the case that all doctors go on to become consultants either. There simply aren't enough consultant jobs for that to happen. Some doctors just don't want to be consultants, either.

softly apols! didn't realise

so the crux of the problem seems to be these gold-plated career structures

How the fuck have you reached this conclusion from the preceding answers?

A number of reasons:

• The EU allows for free movement so, especially in times of crisis, people will move to where they think they can find a job. Greek doctors are a good example, Greece is still a complete mess, the doctors at DD's top paeds hospital hadn't been paid for 3 months and were asking parents to bring in supplies like syringes, tubes, etc. Greek doctors also tend to speak English and many have already studied in the US and UK so the transition is easier.

• Medical schools in the UK cannot meet demand for doctors. I used to teach at Leeds MS and basic things were lacking, e.g. we had 270 students in the year but only 250 seats in the auditorium, we had so few cadavers we had to increase anatomy lessons from 3 to 6 to 12 students per cadaver and, the most difficult, it was very very tough to get busy clinicians to volunteers for teaching duties.

• The vast majority of students would struggle to pay the costs of medical education, estimated to be around 20-35k per year. Medical schools are loss making enterprises for Universities that have to be subsidised by other departments and the state, but we all benefit from having doctors.

• Foreign health care professionals in the UK are nothing new. The UK has always attracted junior doctors from all over the world who come over for training and in some areas, like nursing, there has been an enormous drain of practitioners from other countries (that is causing enormous problems to these countries that struggle to train their students and then lose them to higher wages abroad - lose/lose situation for them).