Junior doctors

[IamSuperTired]

Before people suggest it, I'm not intending to bash junior doctors. They work incredibly hard in a massively under funded NHS. I was also surprised recently to hear they earn less than I thought.

I am posting to ask if anyone knows how long it takes to go from junior doctor to a more senior level where the pay is better? And what's the career path from medical degree to the grade above junior doc?

I ask because other professions, even in healthcare, also get paid pretty poorly at the lower grades but tolerate it because they will eventually reach v large salaries. Eg. Psychologists do their degree, then usually MSc, then often have to work in band 4 jobs for 3 or 4 years to gain the pre-requisite experience, before moving onto another 3 years doctorate level training (is this equivalent to junior doc?) paid at band 6. So in total it takes them (on average) about 8 years before they reach band 7 NHS wage. Other professions are similar.

I'm asking because I'm trying to work out whether the pay is a little unfair or a lot unfair! Given potential future earnings and when they might be reaped! Just trying to educate myself really. Not sure what the AIBU is :) sorry!

Anything from 5-10 years after leaving medical school https://www.healthcareers.nhs.uk/explore-roles/doctors/training-doctor/training-doctor

A junior doctor is any grade below consultant level. Surgery for example will be med school to qualify, then practising as a doctor for two foundation years and eight further years on a speciality training grade. Then apply for consultant posts.

Go away goady.

I'm not trying to be goady! Just trying to understand because I don't know if I'm with them 100% or not! My knowledge of docs is based on psychiatrists I work with! The consultants earn over 100k and the non-consultants I work with seem to be on around 70k+, which I thinks quite nice :) But not sure the route for most docs and when the 70k kicks in!

(FWIW, I think ALL NHS staff need a pay rise! Many work bloody hard! And they all (including junior docs) work in an underfunded, understaffed NHS that's on its knees)

Thanks titchy!

So for the 8 speciality years before consultant, what's the pay?

Starts at £29k goes up to £58k.

Such appalling pay.

my daughter is currently applying to med school. Just to get in is soul destroying. It’s so so difficult. Even if you get the grades, the chance of acceptance onto a med course is limited.
These folk want to become doctors, yet it’s soooo difficult to get there. In the meantime, there’s a huge shortage of doctors. Plus the pay is atrocious.

so so many barriers

This is wildly optimistic, particularly for women. I am 10 years post-qualification and still very, very much a junior due to convoluted career route and childcare commitments. I will probably never be a consultant. I get paid somewhere between £17-18/hour.

There are a few qualified GPs from my year group, perhaps one or two (male) consultants who have trained full time, but the vast majority are still working their way through training, or indeed in the Southern Hemisphere…

Not unheard of to take 15 years or more to make consultant level, particularly for women.

The thread where the op posted her pay slip went from about £1600 per month to £2700 per month in 3 years.

(A pay rise I could only dream of)

The level above a junior doctor is a consultant.

A registrar is a senior junior doctor, but a junior doctor nonetheless. Their basic pay is around £58K before then becoming a consultant.

So theoretically you can be working as a doctor for well over a decade (more if you took time out for research, fellowships, Mat leave, part time) and still be a "junior" doctor.

The term junior needs an overhaul.

I think the the title of junior doctor is very misleading to those not in the know as such. I mistakingly thought until fairly recently that it was a doctor who was not long qualified and still ‘learning’ in some way. I know now that it can be someone who has practising for a good number of years (basically someone who isn’t a consultant). Happy to be corrected though. The Twitter thread I saw where a junior doctor whose take home pay was £1800 was shocking….I dread to think how many hours were worked for this too. And on top of that he had to pay for exams etc from his own salary. How on earth they expect to recruit and retain anyone is beyond me.

The £70k salaries don't just start automatically after a certain level of experience is gained

There are exams to be passed to progress through the stages to reach consultant level. Unless things have changed since the hellish years my friend was living through this, those exams are competitive and set so that only the top X% pass, so it's entirely possible for a decent but not stellar person who knows their stuff to a good level but doesn't tend to fly at top-of-the-class to get stuck year after year getting just a few percent below the pass mark. Some give up and pursue other careers.

Junior doctors should be paid a decent rate for their real work right now, not underpaid in some kind of perverse tradeoff for the fact that they will get more in the future.

I was a "junior doctor" for 12 1/2 years, until the day before I became a consultant. That was about average for then. These days, for my speciality, the shortest time someone would be a "junior doctor" before becoming a consultant is 10 years.

Quite shocked at how little our doctors get paid. Pathetic! Rishi Sunak should be embarrassed & ashamed of himself. I know many ppl who have never been to uni who earn far more than this. No disrespect but this is cleaning staff pay & I'm angry

In my specialty it’s about ten years post graduation. Fortunately it’s not one that requires multiple fellowship years and an PhD after that period.

I was solely responsible for resuscitating adults, children and neonates at night long before then.

Anyone in other professions who would prefer to have that responsibility themselves as their ‘trainee’ period is of course welcome to jump ship at any time.

The pay is on the very low side considering doctor’s skills. The issue however is more that for very many years they have received below inflation pay deals. 35% is the level they would require to take them back to the point they would be at if they’d be appropriately paid historically.

The vast majority of junior doctors don't progress straight through their training. So whilst it appears that they would have to do 8-9 years before becoming a consultant, the reality is that it usually takes a lot longer. The reasons are many, but the most common include: job competition (doctors have to apply for new training posts at different points in their career - these are all competitive and many excellent doctors don't get training posts meaning that they can't progress), maternity leave/parental leave, dropping to less than full time (when full time hours are 48 hours per week, many doctors need to work less than full time to juggle childcare etc but that then prolongs their training time significantly) and time out of training to pursue other opportunities (you need a PhD in many specialties to have a chance of getting a consultant job).

Doctors also have to pay for all the exams needed to progress. The final exams to be a surgeon are around £2k. Training is actually pretty competitive now, there are so many hoops to jump through to score enough points to progress at each stage that just doing the "basic" 8-10 years often isn't enough.

I've lots of friends that are consultants or junior doctors and given what they do and the responsibility that they have none of them get paid enough, even the consultants.

Does anyone know anyone who is at a late stage of a career as a doctor who is not wealthy?every doctor I know (I and most of my friends are mid 50s) are very wealthy indeed. And their pensions are mindblowingly massive. These are public sector workers. If junior if junior doctors want more pay, how about they agree to lower late-career pay? They have to understand the nhs is funded purely by the uk taxpayers. You cannot compare salaries like those in countries with part private funding such as Australia. That’s comparing apples and pears. We need to be giving places at medical school to those that understand this, respect this and want to work in the nhs.

I'm not sure what your point is? If we're talking about our friends, I know only one person who studied medicine who didn't come from a relatively wealthy family. I also noticed at uni that there was a distinct private school air about the med school (I'm from private school too). It wasn't the place you'd go if you were looking to find people from inner city council estates (where I'm also from...).

Obviously they don't come from the wealthiest families, because they advise their kids to go into finance.

I have a doctor friend right now who drives a BMW convertible. She works 3-4 days a week. She and DH live in a big house, in an expensive pert of town. Her parents bought her the car as a gift and they gave a substantial amount of money as the house deposit. She's 50.

I also know of a doctor who lives in subsidised housing. He doesn't have wealthy parents.

The issue isn't about who we know though, is it?

When people say "the NHS is chronically underfunded" or "the NHS is on its knees" that includes the staff! The NHS isn't a bunch of buildings, or equipment, or some kind of machine. You can have a medical service in a field tent, but you cannot have it without the staff.

Do you think other professions just GET pay rises without progressing and further education beyond basic qualifications?

Many junior doctors also do research degrees (PhD/MDs) - it is almost expected or is standard in some specialties and is often in the desirable section of the person specifications on job adverts for consultant posts. This will add another 3 years on to the period of time before they reach the level required to apply for consultant jobs (note that this is not training time) and can stagnate pay and pension contributions.

It's a shame they didn't wait for interest rates to go down, instead they contribute towards a wage spiral and it's their most vulnerable patients who suffer in wage spirals. I also note they didn't include Annexe B as a reason for their strike as the Irish police refused to implement that type of nonsense, all noted.

The answer is it takes a long time. As I said on the other thread, becoming a consultant is more like being a Headteacher, so it's like saying that teachers have the potential to earn huge salaries because they could all become heads. Many great doctors are stuck at registrar level either because of lack of training places or lack of consultant posts. Of the senior junior doctors I know (ie in it for over ten years post graduation) only one has made consultant. Three have recently gone to fellowships in Australia, one is on the training pathway finally in her mid thirties, two have gone to retrain as GPs

Sorry posted too soon. TRIGGER WARNING

You should also know two took their own lives. I'm not blaming NHS pay here but these were good ' junior' doctors working in A&E who just couldn't see a way past the stress. So no, not everyone can look forward to being a consultant in ten years.