To resent doctors who leave the profession?

[Prrambulate]

IN PARTICULAR, to take up lucrative management consultancy roles at the likes of McKinsey. I know three doctors among my uni cohort who have left the profession in the early-mid 30s, very close to or having trained at consultancy level for specialisms like ophthalmology, orthopaedics. It seems to be happening more often but that could just be my perception.

It’s frustrating because medical places are significantly capped in the UK, getting a place on a course is difficult, and training these doctors is costly. And then just to lose these qualified doctors at a time of dire need in the NHS is kind of maddening.

The govt says it costs around 230k to train a student through med school. Even if you deduct the tuition fees from that you’re still looking at around a 180k cost.

People are free to get new jobs to maximise their earnings and get away from awful working conditions. This is the fault of NHS management - the work and conditions are clearly not worth the salary and stress.

All this about us having paid for their training is wild when you consider the hours that medical students are expected to work on placements.

They earned it.

Being a doctor in the UK at the moment sounds absolutely shit and I can’t blame anyone for taking a better offer. Let’s hope the next government makes it a less shit option. 😢

However I do believe everyone should be able to leave any job when they want. We don’t have indentured servitude in this country.

EVERYONE’S careers pay much less than they used to. I’ll admit doctors salaries have been eroded more than most, but the inability to acknowledge that everyone’s salary has been eroded and asking for a 35% rise is massively tone deaf.

All this bumpf about part time.
For those who don't understand why doctors are increasingly going part time.
Basically the workload has massively increased and gotten more complex meaning that the working day is far longer and more exhausting than it used to be.
I don't know any GPs (male or female) who work 10 sessions (full time) a week because it's too exhausting and the burn out risk is so high. Work days have turned into 10-12 hour shifts and people have gone part time in response to that reality.

Possibly outing but I’m a clinical specialist doctor (did most of my training outside of the UK). I’m non medical - in an area of health that has 50% vacant posts at my level. I’m seriously considering leaving my NHS role. I already do part time, paid for 32 hours in 4 days, on those days I’m often expected to work from 8-8 (pre paperwork). At least two days a week I don’t get to see my kids awake. I love my job but it’s soul destroying to be constantly unable to offer the level of care people should receive, due to a lack of resources and time. I don’t think salaries need to match private work - but for context, I’ve responsibility for a team of 60+ nurses/mdt in an area where lives are lost weekly and I earn less than 50k. my wage privately would be much less hours, for three times the salary. I can understand the pull to leave the NHS.

There are big problems now with drop out rates at medical schools too, so I don’t think throwing the doors open to more students is the answer.

Fundamentally every country has a limited pool of intelligent, compassionate, hard-working, conscientious people. It needs to nurture them because the pool is finite and these qualities are needed for all sorts of jobs. If you treat the workers you need the most with scorn, they won’t go for the jobs you want them to go for. And they will probably emigrate.

Want doctors to stay in the NHS? Make the NHS an attractive place to work. We didn't have this problem 14 years ago, I wonder what changed?

As for pay as a junior doctor, you have to pay thousands for your exams, GMC reg and insurance.
You also have to rotate jobs and move areas, often at late notice (I once got changed from one training location to another with two weeks notice and they were 2 hours apart by train, I had just moved house for the first training location and had to commute for 6 months).
It's a tough life, interesting, but tough.

Just remembered eating beans for a week to pay for some exams I had to take.
And had a car crash after doing a tonne of Emergency Department shifts.
There's a lot of low points, along with the high points.

22 year NHS veteran. Consultant for 10. Sub specialist. Two sets of postgraduate exams and a masters degree all funded by me.

People are leaving because working conditions are shite.

I don't have a desk. The IT barely functions. Trying to print a request label for a blood test is a major endeavour. The nursing staff are so stressed they are barely functioning. Forget trying to get basic obs, medication given and your patient prepared for their operation in time. My department isn't staffed to the levels recommended by our professional body. We have been raising our concerns about the safety aspects of this for more than 6 years. But there is "no money". In this time we have opened two further sites out of our main operating theatre complex thus stretching our cover even further.

We have had recurrent issues with sickness on our junior doctor rota. The trust leadership is on record as saying they would rather pay consultants to act down to cover rota gaps than escalate the bank rates for junior doctor cover (juniors ask for about 50% of consultant pay). End result the same group of consultant doctors is covering their own on call rota, sickness on that (and there has been a lot) and sickness on the junior doctor rota. We are all totally and utterly burnt out.

I have three colleagues away on sabbatical trying out careers in other countries. I don't think it's a coincidence.

Oh, and I work more than full time!

OK, so how many of these money grabbing, NHS-defecting doctors thought at the age of 17, "Hey, what I really want to do is work for a management consultancy. I think spending and extra couple of years at uni accumulating more debt and then and then going through a few more years of shit pay and gruelling work is TOTALLY the best way to hit that goal!"

I was a female full time doctor, thought I would be and in the same job until I retired.

Until I wasn't.

Toxic management can get you at any time even if you think you are secure.

My DD would just like a job next year. We have enough doctors. Not enough jobs..

Excuse my ignorance but what do you mean? It’s always in the news how many vacancies there are for doctors and the shortage?

Also a lot of us really worked ourselves to the bone during the pandemic and I'll be honest most of my colleagues are extremely burned out and many (including me) have developed health issues because of that.
I've gone part time myself in the last year as my health can no longer hold up under full time hours. I feel strongly I was damaged by my job and what I was required to do during the pandemic, and yet here I am taking the salary cut and suffering the health consequences. It feels particularly galling when snide comments are made about part timers.

Doctors wages are now pretty low vs the amount of training required - especially for those pre-consultant who are wanting to buy homes, start families etc.

In your 30s you might be earning ~£60k, working night shifts, being moved around to different hospitals… plus the general disaster that is workload and staffing.

Is it so surprising they’d jump to a 9-5 for twice the money, with the scope the earn more?

Being a doctor is supposed to be a high-paying, high-status job. That’s been killed in the last 10 years.

Rubbish. The tuition fee doesn't even cover the cost of academic tuition, let alone clinical placements. NHS trust are paid £millions to provide placements / assess med students.

Totally depends what level of training you are at and what specialty - could be absolutely no jobs or loads of jobs.

My specialty has masses of vacancies at consultant level - which leads to the existing ones getting tired, lonely, burnt out and leaving to be with others. It doesn't take much for a thriving service to go to a collapsing one with just one person leaving. And once it's collapsing they can't recruit a replacement as no-one wants to go there.

The number of foundation doctor (ie straight after uni) jobs is capped by the government. So if you have 10,000 students graduating from med school but only 9,500 F1 jobs, there won't be enough to go round.

Recently diagnosed with Ovarian Cancer,I am immensely grateful for the Doctors caring for me. I have a female oncologist , she is very good. If she decided to leave / surely that's up to her. (Obv I hope she doesn't). Do you think that all Doctors should stay -ft even if it impacts on their lives. What about Teachers/nurses?

I agree with every word of this but we could offer incentives. Writing off student debt for a stipulated period working in the NHS would be a good start for doctors and dentists.

Most doctors now work part-time. Works out about 35-40 hours a week.

That’s full time for a lot of jobs, but amateur hour for professionals who get the same sort of pay. Or worse pay.

Medics often marry each other, so when the first baby arrives society gets two part-timers rather than two full doctors.

I don’t think you should force anyone to stay in any job but I can’t see the problem charging for the training.