To wonder why we treat our Junior Doctors so badly?

[alfredomuretto]

These people have likely been the very brightest in their school, got very high grades, struggled through 5 years of university (£9k fees). Then they get to enjoy two years of being a junior doctor. They have to work very long hours, in appalling stressful conditions, direly understaffed, with nurses treated just as badly. Then they get a starting salary of £27k.

Why aren't we valuing them better?

TF is right plus often no pensions these days either at least not with any employer contrinbution. I have my state pension at age 67 to look forward to. Never had an employer contribution in my life.

@hopping People do this as they realise they have a great opportunity that they want to maximise, are physically able to at this age and are willing to put in the hard graft in an effort to secure their future so sacrificing several years of life up front is nothing.

I trained as a lawyer at a Magic Circle law firm in the City and my view of this attitude is that it is real gamble with no guarantee of partnership at the end of the line. Working yourself to the bone during the best years of your life? Cancelling or working through holidays at last minute? No, thanks.

I now work “in house” for a legal team in a company in the financial services sector. Good salary, intellectual challenge, holidays when I want them, decent hours. I have A levels all at A in 3 sciences and a language; at my very academic school, if you were bright, you were encouraged into a) medicine or b) law. And I toyed with becoming a doctor.

But, reading this, I am absolutely delighted and relieved I chose the latter.

All who work in the health service are amazing, from the most low paid to the highest. I am always amazed by everyone's kindness whenever I am in contact with them. Of course some people have bad days but it's such a difficult stressful job I don't not blame them for the odd off day.
Same goes for teachers. Another demanding stressful job that I am really grateful to those who work in that area.

The big problem is the race to the bottom. DH is a vet, there is a horrible retention crisis at about 5 years out of vet school. Solution is recruit more vet students... who aren't well supported because no senior vets to support.. who jump ship to e.g. medicine.

Issues are no prospects of earning a good salary for the hours and no prospects of having a say, being managed by non clinicians who have no clue how long stuff takes, or how long it takes to drive 30 miles on country roads. Oh and ethical issues with some of the corporate practices pricing etc...

I have had some fantastic junior doctors. And some very good looking ones

If you’re good enough to be a Dr, you’re good enough to earn 3x as much in another profession, regardless of background!

Really? If you put a young doctors salary at £40k do you think they would have had a strong chance of earning £120k doing something else? Some would - agreed - but most? No way.

Tough job I could never do but the idea that doctors are low paid (particularly outside the South East) compared with other professions doesnt really add up.

If you’re good enough to be a Dr, you’re good enough to earn 3x as much in another profession, regardless of background!

See, this is the problem right here. This just isn’t true. When doctors compare themselves to what they see as ‘equivalent’ professions, they always seem to be looking at magic circle law types and the cream of investment banking.

There just aren’t that many of these jobs and the competition for them is fierce. So while some doctors could be earning significantly more, most couldn’t.

And in these careers, you probably won’t be earning mega bucks over your whole career. By 40, many are burnt out and or have retreated to something less pressured.

That’s not to say I don’t think doctors work hard for their money, they do. But it’s still right up there as a well remunerated career, given the path to consultancy and (especially) the pension.

If you’re good enough to be a Dr, you’re good enough to earn 3x as much in another profession, regardless of background!

Not sure that’s right. My husband had an issue last summer and we went to hospital. The consultant we saw said, “so you have a problem with your knee” (it was a foot issue). We contradicted him, but he said it at least once more before we asked him to read the referral letter from the GP. He glanced over it and then said “Oh sorry: because the GP’s diagnosis was [x], I assumed it was a knee problem.”

You assumed? ASSUMED?! If you do any assuming as a lawyer, you’re running serious risk and, if you’re wrong, you’re likely to be hauled over the coals for atrocious attention to detail.

Apart from which, the two jobs tend to call for different skill-sets.

Reading these posts it does seem that people like to find excuses to bash doctors.

I’m almost 100% certain this thread was not started by a doctor but clearly there are people obsessed with medics so much that they need to start the same type of thread about every 4-6 weeks!

And this is why I say pick your specialty carefully when sacrificing your best years to training to be a doc.

I’m a midwife doing 44 hours a week for £22.5k, that will rise slightly with experience but will never reach the levels others get for doing less hours in a less stressful job. In fact my partner earns more working part time in sales. In case you hadn’t noticed NHS staff are chronically underpaid and overworked.

Btw - for those who say that drs have good pay and conditions as consultants, it very much depends on the specialty (just like people talking about law etc outside the SE). In fact it may actually be worse for Drs in London (than other parts of country) as the London weighting is negligible compared to cost of living.

Just like it is v competitive to get partnership, it’s hard to get a post in a ‘desk’ speciality (ie less walking around wards, late nights in hospital). Some people have to do pHDs, publish papers, move area to enhance their CV to get to the specialism they want. Increasingly there are getting to be comparatively fewer desk specialities as there are more older people who get unwell - so they need more consultants on the rota. Also Medico legal issues mean there have to be more consultants around who stay later (eg til 10pm). Don’t think consultant is v attractive job tbh - even with the pay.

I’m almost 100% certain this thread was not started by a doctor

OP said earlier in the thread that her DD was a junior doctor!

@ MontStMichel
Yes thanks for clarifying my point although I’m questioning even that- honestly my parents have never cared that much about my pay and working conditions to start a whole thread online.

@catchingbabies midwives and nurses are massively underpaid, doctors are somewhat underpaid. Playing each against the others is a good way to keep all salaries low and make Ts & Cs worse.

I’m not playing them against each other I’m saying NHS staff are all underpaid and the conditions are truly awful at the moment therefore agreeing with the OP.

TFBundy
And this is very much a personal view, but the idea of doctors being "considerably cleverer than you" (to paraphrase Harry Enfield) is a bit laughable to those of us who have done okay in other professions.

I agree with that and also wrt your observations on the topic of barristers.

In the US, both law and medicine are postgrad courses, with many people in both who could have gone into either one after their undergrad degree.

I know a really, really, really bright Ear, Nose and Throat doctor whose undergrad degree is in Chinese (her first language is English).

Systems like the American one where people specialise relatively late in their undergrad career and must take courses in science, maths, literature, humanities, history and more as well as courses in their major tend to produce versatile graduates, especially when it comes to very selective universities.