Should she have got priority treatment over other non-urgent patients?

[Rabbitradar]

DD is an SHO (dr) in A&E in city X. She was off duty yesterday and so came home and stayed here last night in city Y which is 30 miles from city X. She was due on shift at 10am this morning. Unfortunately one of her contact lenses tore in her eye and despite several attempts a piece of contact lens remained in her eye causing blurred vision and mild pain.
She could not drive due to blurred vision so I drove her to eye casualty in city Y.
Waiting room packed (9am) and average wait time 4 hours.
DD didn’t ask for priority treatment - and wouldn’t dream of expecting to be seen before anybody requiring urgent treatment. She did ask what the waiting time was and explained she was due on shift in A&E at hospital X.

However, to me it seems nuts that she is spending the morning sat in a waiting room with lots of other non-urgent casualties (and doubtless some urgent ones too) whilst 30 miles down the road at hospital X the waiting room in A&E will be backing up further as they are 1 Dr down.

AIBU to think that in some circumstances -like these - it would be sensible for NHS staff to get priority treatment?

Please note I am not suggesting that any other patient’s treatment is compromised just that other non-urgent patients have to wait a bit longer ....

Its funny how no one here can ever criticise a nurse or a doctor etc., until they try to get some treatment sorted out ASAP to allow them to carry on working and then they are pond life.

You know, like when some come on and say I was at hospital and me/my child/elderly parent was treated like shit the most popular answer is no you weren't, closely followed by you should be grateful its free. Fabulous NHS staff etc. Apart from OP's DD, she can't be fabulous too.

Where do you draw the line though @Rabbitradar ? What if it was injured firefighter due to go on shift?

I think she should have been seen quicker than anyone else in her category of severity...interestingly I was at an eye a&e recently and a doctor came in and he was prioritised so he could get back onto the ward - I heard the conversation they called out the nurse in charge to make the call at reception before he was triaged.

Where do you draw the line though @Rabbitradar ? What if it was injured firefighter due to go on shift? This was my question exactly but noone is able to answer it.
Noone is saying doctors aren't amazing- they absolutely are and I admire their long working hours and dedication to the job tremendously. But the question was- should they jump the queue at A&E and no, they shouldn't. A&E should be based on medical need, not on job title. There are LOTS of other really vital, important jobs aside from doctor. Eg firefighters, police, bomb disposal experts, rapid response mental health services, lifeboat crews, paramedics/ambulance crew, and so on. If you are going to argue doctors should get to jump the queue by virtue of profession, then so should these professions too, and then- who judges which profession is more important than the others?!

@CallmeAngelina thank you - it seems that regardless of the facts some pp are intent on reframing this. Oh well. This is AIBU so I guess it goes with the territory!
@DishingOutDone - thank you too. You are spot on.

YANBU. This is a straight up numbers game.

Your DD getting her eye sorted out asap moves the maximum number of people along the fastest.

No brainer that medics get treated first so that they can then treat others. A waste if a valuable and scarce resource.

It isn't about fairness it is about efficiency.

I’m not saying many medics don’t do a great job but OP hasn’t seemed to answer why a medic should get priority (not at their own hospital!) compared to other emergency services workers. 🤷🏻‍♀️

I get what you are saying @beautifulstranger101. And yes, where do you draw the line?
The paradox is that DD being 4 hours plus late for her shift means that lots of patients in her A&E dept will have had to wait far longer. I appreciate the nuances of this but it’s a tricky one. All I know is that if I were running a business and did a cost benefit analysis on this it would be a no brainer. But as I said upthread , I admit that in the current system IABU.

It's not about whose job is most important to society though, is it. It's about logic. Seeing DD quicker means that she can get to work quicker, which means the patients waiting at that hospital get seen quicker; it benefits others. I used to work for fire, if being one short puts the county on its arse then you are absolutely doing it wrong, it's just not the same for an individual doctor.

@IAmNotAWitch exactly!

@Tetraread yes!

If you were a non-urgent case in ED, would you rather a longer wait in ED with a queue that was perceived to be fair or a shorter wait while the ED doctor who is supposed to be on duty skips the queue?

That’s essentially what this boils down to. Arguing over whose time is worth more seems to be missing the point slightly.

It’s a bit of common sense really. Another A&E will have been dangerously backed up due to DD missing her shift and it was an easily solvable issue. If she’s broken her leg that would be different.

I had this situation happen. I thought I was miscarrying earlier this year and was in a lot of pain. There was a 4 hour wait at A&E, DH is a Dr at that hospital so he left his theatre and came down to be with me.

Suddenly they seemed to be doing everything immediately. DH missing was causing issues and they needed him back ASAP 👍🏻

I don’t feel guilty or like this was unfair. I was bleeding heavily and in pain. My DH was obviously going to come and be with me. It was the hospitals choice how long that took and what level of disruption that caused. We could have waited 4 hours.

Hopefully it will increase your dds empathy when she goes back on shift seeing it from the other side.

What is suggesting that she doesn't currently have empathy for the patients? If you have read the thread it was her mum who thought she should have been prioritised, not DD who was stressed about missing the start of her shift.

Are you living vicariously through the status of your DD's job?

Maybe there were some people who were waiting who were highearners who charged per hour, and therefore the taxman was deprived of revenue? Or maybe a bus service was a driver short so many commuters were impacted. Or maybe a surgery was on hold due to a top class Dr being at A&E too.

Who knows, but it is just a&e and life goes on. Surely no department is so dependent on one Dr.

Also, if she could work at hospital x while she was waiting to be seen, could she not go to a&e after her shift, given the supposed impact on society?

YANBU of course she should have priority as a DR needed in an A&E! Can't understand logic of other posters. She works A&E not just some outpatients clinic etc. She's needed at work and should definitely have been bumped up. And posters are wrong when they say hospital has no incentive, everyone has an incentive to have A&E staff at work wherever that may be!

I think if anyone thought that medical staff could be given priority over others, regardless of any good reason, there would be a lot of resentment. As others have said, where would you draw the line given the importance of the police, fire service, and people such as those who work in caring for those unable to manage themselves.

@Tetraread I don't understand the stress. Having being raised by a Dr and been surrounded by them, I doubt that anyone is so altruistic and empathetic about patients. It becomes routine. Maybe it is stress everyone feels when late for work.

Me personally, I think young Dr's now are mollycoddles and babied. They seem delicate and complain a lot whereas the old timers seemed more stoic about hours and stress, though I appreciate the deteriation of the NHS. I think a typical Dr has received a lot of support, involvement, encouragement and financial help (in terms of private education which a number of Drs have benefitted from) and the young a&e Dr I know is still babied by her parents who talk in detail about the travails of their work.

The reason you’re getting such vitriol is because your posts barely conceal how superior you consider your DD: a humble, patient, caring, selfless, conscientious A&E frontline doctor in the NHS, working back to back 12hr shifts.

I’m sure she’s worked very hard and will assume she’s a great A&E doctor. But there are many, many hundreds of thousands of people in the UK who do critical jobs that other people’s livelihoods depend on.

Your daughter is special to you, and may perform lifesaving procedures in the course of her duties that make her important to others, too. But she’s not more deserving of special treatment as a consequence.

And this just shows the mean spirited totally weird thought processes of some people. So many others in hospital X are to be affected because one doctor is to wait her turn in A&E. Common sense surely says a doctor that is due on shift would take priority over other non-emergency cases. Just like I would expect any emergency worker who was or was about to be on shift to take priority. Wow people really!?

Interesting how many eye specialists on here who have been able to judge the severity and complexity of the dd's condition over the medium of MN without seeing her, and are able to over-rule the professional who actually saw her and said she should go to A&E.

No matter how you frame it, a piece of contact lens in an eye is neither severe nor complex. If it has torn it is obviously a soft lens with no sharp edges and would be merely an irritant with no propensity to do serious damage.

As several on here have said, we have found ourselves in a similar situation and been sorted out with no fuss or dire result by a local optician.

I don’t understand why on earth she went to A&E and not an opticians - this has happened to me, i went to my local opticians and was sorted out free or charge in about 10mins ....

Does no one else let emergency service workers jump the queue in starbucks/macd’s and the like?

I always let an on shift emergency worker go first. 10 mins is no skin off my nose, could have a knock on effect all day for those who need the services.

YABVU - queue jumping because she has a Very Important Job