Newly trained doctors-you need to know this

[2020Raquet]

DSS3 is about to be a newly qualified FY2 doctor along without about 8,000 from his cohort (number who qualified this year). There are about 1000 jobs for them to apply for in the NHS this year. So we, the tax payer have paid an average of £250,000 to £327,009 to train these doctors over the past 7-9 years and 87% will not have a job.

A simple google search (appreciate that not be the most accurate, so happy to be corrected if based on facts) show that 20,060 doctors immigrated to the U.K. in 2024.

DSS3 is emigrating because he has little other choice.

The doctors strikes are not based on money, but the fact that they come out of uni with £100’s of £1,000’s of debt in a job apparently vital in the U.K., but with no job prospects!!

AIBU to believe the system has failed.

Absolutely hear this, my partner works for an academic charity, so I am somewhat aware of the HE crisis.

It doesn't take away from the fact that this is why resident doctors are angry and wanting to strike, it's not an either/or situation.

Victims of DEI targets..

I've had a few terrifying encounters with foreign doctors.

I'm not a racist, it feels like I have to say that. A fantastic consultant from India saved my life during my c-section in 2010. But she spoke perfect English and I never once felt she was anything other than professional and competent.

Over the last three years, due to a lot of family ill health, I've had the misfortune to witness doctors who should not be practicing. There were clear language barriers, two gave dangerous advice (and my complaints were ignored despite one hospital doctor advising a treatment that would have resulted in death due to a very clearly communicated severe allergy), and sadly one seemed to just dismiss female patients as nothing (though I concede that may have not been just cultural, but good old fashioned misogyny.)

This is a scandal just waiting to explode.

This happened to me in 2005 after I graduated... the story isn't new. The we were hit with the 2008 recession and I did a MSc. in Physiotherapy and even after that I worked as a Physio assistant/Casual Bank for 18 months as there were no permenant jobs. My friend who was a doctor and my friend who did law all had similar experiences.

The fact is going to university doesn't guarantee you a job in any field. It depends on experience and who you know- when you are on your placements you have to really work those contacts.

I would advise anyone doing their A-levels to not bother applying until they are at least 21 with a plan on how they are going to do it without a loan. When I went we had subsidised fees. but with full fees and a huge increase in the number of people with degrees it doesn't mean anything.

People who have just graduated I would advise they get as much experience as possible relevant to their field in a causal postion as this is incredibly valuable for contacts and early notice on when jobs maybe available.

when pregnant with ds 32 years ago the Chinese seeming doctor spoke to me about an issue i had - i could not understand a word he said.
this is not new

Exactly this and not just with doctors but across all levels of care. It’s the most vulnerable most at risk and yes is a scandal waiting to happen.

I currently have an elderly relative in hospital and I am shocked at the poor standard of English of 90% of the staff.
We can’t actually find out what is wrong with her as no one can explain.

Can we dump the “all foreign doctors/nurses are shit and can’t speak English” line. It’s highly offensive. I’ve worked in the NHS for 40 years across 20 different trusts and met and worked with colleagues from all over the world I’ve met a small minority of crap doctors/nurses from every country including those who were white English and trained in the UK. I’ve also met amazing dedicated caring doctors/nurses who didn’t train in the UK and were definitely not white English.
With regard to language problems 30-40 years ago I did work with doctors (in particular) who were difficult to understand, the worst one I met was Italian but this is very rare these days.
Of course we should be ensuring the doctors and nurses we train are able to stay here on qualifying it’s an absolute disgrace that they can’t. I now work in a small rural trust we had 80 student nurses qualify and there were only 20 jobs there were no jobs in MH or midwifery.

I agree... people only see what they chose to see.

If it wasn't for all the foreign staff that the NHS relies on, it would have crumbled years ago.

The NHS is fucked because a complex reasons including aging population with much higher needs than 30 years ago.

Can we dump the straw man you have set up there?

Many, many foreign born doctors and nurses are excellent and necessary.

Some, however, have very poor English and cannot communicate safely with patients. If you have never seen this, you are very fortunate, or very unobservant.

Some British born doctors are also poor communicators, and terrible at their jobs. That does not mean that the risk factor of not having English as a first language should be ignored.

In general, people working in the NHS are, in my extensive professional experience, absolutely useless at making risk assessments.

It hasn't.

People stated concerns around language barriers and cultural differences that can compromise the quality of care an individual receives.

Why are such things always brushed aside as racism?

I disagree about risk assessment, compared to other sectors they are very good.

To me its about setting targets and acutally understanding how to actualise them.

Its almost a victim of success... because its such a political football everyone is way to scared to touch it. So they make promises without thinking about whether that is actually valuable for the population.

My son and DiL are "resident"doctors (previously called junior Drs) so I've seen all this over the last few years. They are treated appallingly within the NHS and I can understand precisely why they have all been striking. It seems to me, generally, the delivery of clinical services is excellent. In almost every other area (admin, structure, back-office systems etc) in the NHS is a complete shambles. However, it has taken 14-15 years of previous Governments to get it to this position and I don't envy Wes Streeting one bit, but at least he seems to be trying to make some changes. The whole "physician associate" thing has not helped either and simply undermined the position of newly qualified doctors imo.

Not only foreign doctors who harm patients - remember Shipman , Bramhall , Wakefield. Also nursing staff - Allitt etc al. All who harm patients will experience consequences (hopefully)

I thought all incoming doctors to the UK had to satisfy English language requreiments? Or are they utter bollocks?

Requirements!!!!!!!!

Ignoring all the racism on this thread, my dd is in her first foundation year and is planning to go to Australia when she finishes. Apart from anything else, what a waste of all the (financial) investment that the country has spent on her. It just doesn't make economic sense!

I don't think anyone has said they're all shit?

I do wonder if there's a barrier based on education that you aren't seeing necessarily? If these doctors are recruited by medical specialists speaking in medical terms, is there not a risk that as PP said, there might be idiomatic barriers between them and patients who do not speak the same medical language AS WELL as main language? Effectively needing to translate twice.

FWIW, it's far from the only issue with healthcare communication. The treatment of women's pain, for example being an absolute shocker.

Well that’s depressing.

I can assure you that I see it done very badly, with over- emphasis on saving money, and failure to effectively implement risk mitigations.

Where is he emigrating?

Has he actually got this sorted?

Our daughter finished her foundation 2 years training in August and luckily had saved hard to go travelling for 6 months whilst she had the chance . Very few of her friends have jobs many are unemployed unless they went to Australia. When she started her degree she said was almost guaranteed a job in one of the less competitive sectors ie paediatrics and she has applied for this for next August but her chances are very low, last year she wouldn't have any qualified for an interview . It's heartbreaking and shocking .If we don't open up many training places and don't train many drs. Where will we be in years to come .

Thinking about these bottlenecks in the system.

I am no expert on healthcare but we have a similar issue in education. Finding suitable trainee teachers takes time. Actually training them takes time. Ditto with qualified staff.

I am training a (very good) teacher trainee at the moment. I have zero allowance of time to do this. Not one single extra minute. I do it because I think it's important and to pay it forward because people helped me similarly when I was a trainee. I'm supposed to evidence that I've done 15 hours of training myself!

I went away for the weekend with a doctor friend a couple of years back and she disclosed that a lot of her time when she is training younger doctors is actually spent supporting them with serious mental health problems

We found a lot in common. Both doing these essential tasks that relate directly to the future workforce but with no time allowance to do them. We're both going to be knackered by 60 and we've got decent pensions...

Some of those posts are 1 year contracts its the training posts they cannot get. So they will never become registrars or consultants and may have to move each year and apply each year.

I had understood that Streting knows the problem and had offered to fix it by giving UK resident doctors priority but the BMA leadership turned down the offer as they are fixated on pay. So the biggest culprits are Johnson/Sunak for creating this crazy immigration system and the BMA leadership for not looking after the trainees doctors.

The BMA could end this tomorrow if they accept Steeting’s offer for junior doctors and stop striking.

Is anyone else waiting for the usual suspects on the resident doctor threads to appear and resume their squabbling?