Any other medic mums nervously waiting for F1 allocation?

[PiggyPokkyFool]

DD1 was told they should be through at 7.30am and is on wards for 10 so is nervously waiting and hoping it will not be much longer.
Pretty crazy they could be sent anywhere based on a lottery.
Anyone else waiting and fancy keeping me company?

I get it, but it’s just the way it is. My Dd wanted Nottingham last year but got Bristol, so brace yourself!!
All worked out fine, she’s happy etc…..

My child got their first choice, they are over the moon! Good luck to the rest waiting to find out...

Thanks for that @littlemissprosseco . It is good to know that you DD is happy.
Great news @ramonaquimby DD is currently driving so we don't know yet.

fingers crossed @PiggyPokkyFool and everyone else waiting to find out

Yay!! DD got her first choice. Huge sigh of relief here, there and everywhere.
Now just to apply for the hospital she would really like...
Honestly I think this is the most nervous I have been since waiting for A Levels results.

It will be interesting to see the stats for how many got their first choice this year.

One frustrating thing is that F1s already in the UK do not get any priority.

In the past F1s who studied abroad would fill unfilled places. Someone who ran a private medical school in Penang once told me they could get their graduates places in most deaneries, but not London. Now with the lifting of the Resident Labour Market Test, applicants from abroad will receive the same priority. Many of them can be expected to want major cities.

The next stage, post F2, is now even more competitive. Both jobs and training are subject to worldwide competition. Straightforward entry level vacancies are attracting hundreds of candidates. Most current F2s (including those whose mums were on medical school entry threads many years ago) are having to accept that they either move abroad or find a new career.

Detail is on this thread:

Two pieces of advice.

1. Write to your MP. The sooner the problem is understood the sooner we will have priority for essential career progression jobs for those already in the country the better.
2. Your DC need to look closely at what scores points on speciality training. There are already far fewer training places than we need and half are now going to applicants from overseas. The competition for places is rising fast so they really do need to be winning competitions (there are plenty of pay to enter competitions overseas), conducting research, getting papers published (again think beyond the UK) and consider a Masters.

An alternative is after F2 is to enrol in an overseas training institute this one. https://bapiotrainingacademy.com/two-plus-two-programme/ I understand that UK qualifications are accepted. Not cheap, but the career progression path within the UK is very broken and this is one way of circumventing it. .

I don't like to be the bearer of bad news. But equally would not like others to get caught in the way that our DC have. This is the current thread.

www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5275818-aibu-to-be-angry-that-government-policy-means-young-doctors-nurses-and-other-hcps-cannot-find-jobs?page=1

@Needmoresleep That BAPIO Training Academy course you have linked appears to be for those qualified in India. On link the eligibility criteria states 'Full Registration with State Medical Council in India.'

I know. But I understand that India recognises UK qualifications. It looks like a far easier path than the broken career structure available in the UK.

Let's hope the career path issues get fixed asap. Whether this is through a reinstatement of the RLMT or similar or some other changes to the current immigration points based system or through the review of postgraduate training, there's no doubt it's an urgent issue that needs addressing.

My Dd got her first choice, which she was fully not expecting. Her bf of 6 years was preparing to leave his job to move with her. She put London first because 'well someone has to get the places and you never know', then considered ratios etc for the rest of her preferences.

Dd got her first choice as London and got it. She could not believe it and is very happy with the outcome.

@HostessTrolley @ProfessorLayton1

Having followed your journeys from the beginning I am so pleased for you.

Not least it is a good place to find ways to add to a CV.

Article in the Spectator:
https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/junior-doctors-are-being-failed/

(If you register you are allowed a couple of free articles a month.)

She argues that by taking away an element of merit you are disincentivising students from studying hard for final medical school exams.

Yes DS didn’t get first choice and now he knows he is ranked low so doesn’t feel optimistic about which hospital he will be offered. He is despondent and left wondering why he’s trying so hard when it has no influence on where he gets to work. Having started this whole thing in the pandemic they’ve not had it easy and he’s frustrated that it’s outwith his control.

@Friendsmilingwidely
as I mentioned above, my dd was in the same position. Feeling the same. She’s doing great now. It’s hard to be positive in such an awful system, but once he’s working wherever he gets, they won’t care whether he put it first or last!!

Given what you wrote about your DD and her achievements, I'm not at all surprised. Must be a great relief for her though (and the bf!). Many congrats.

Congrats to your DD too ProfessorLayton.

Both your DD and HostessTrolley's DD show that you have to be in it to win it.

Achievements don't carry any weight in allocation of foundation deaneries, and to suggest this shows total ignorance of the system. It's a random number generator.

Achievements don't count any more - the final year students rank the deaneries in order of preference, but what they get is determined by a random number generator, so it's all down to luck basically...

Dd did say today that that data from UKFPO indicates that over 86% got their first choice of deanery this year

@Friendsmilingwidely I am sorry to hear this.* *DD had deliberately chosen an less popular deanery. I think it was a post lockdown thing. She wanted somewhere different from her native London, and so picked somewhere a close friend was from.

She loves it there and wants to stay. The only issue being that having dropped merit from the allocations process, it comes back full force when applying for training. Here you are competing against world wide competition for a relatively very small numbers of places, and so where you need a very full CV. (It never ends.) London rotations are better equipped to support F1/F2s in this than over stretched health services in out of the way places.

DD then heard of a couple the following year who were, unhappily, allocated this deanery. She was in touch with one who was a couple of years below her at her school and then met up with her.This girl and three others in the same position had met up, presumably online, and were sharing a house together and thriving.

Most others went to the local medical school, so I think DD would have found it harder had she not known someone at the start. As it was her first placement group got on really well and still socialise together, but this may not always be the case. I assume your DS will know about forums where potential F1s can meet up. If not I can ask.

Where I think the bigger impact of the new system might be is that in the past there was a big silver lining in choosing an unpopular deanery with good points as it more or less guaranteed you one of your top choices in rotations. It has meant that DD has had some demanding jobs which have helped her nail down the area she wants to go into. Under the new system I wonder what happens. I assume in the past, the same rotations, more or less, went to those who had scored in the bottom 10% nationally and over time jobs and support had been adapted accordingly. With random allocation, the same organic fit won't be there.

HostessTrolley yes indeed. I realised this a couple of minutes later but I'd been travelling for twenty four hours, clicked on MN and typed then realised my brain fail. Not for the first time. I simply couldn't be bothered to ask MN to delete. The main point was just to say good/ must be a big relief.

I've commented on the new form of allocation previously so I don't think anyone can get me on ignorance, just travel fatigue. But indeed, and as I've said before, this isn't entirely random as both your DD and ProfessorLayton's DD show: play bold. It will often pay dividends.

DD tells me at on social media potential F1s are actively referring to her deanery as The Gulag, to current F1/F2 amusement. There is apparently some Cambridge PhD making a bit of a fool of himself, effectively claiming he is too good for them.

That said that Deanery is still on the 2002 contract whereas the England one was revised in 2016. And until a very recent pay rise they were getting £5 less an hour. Apparently F1/F2s in England get a day off a month to work on career stuff. DD doesn't, indeed compulsory online training modules often have to be done in their own time. Staff are so stretched that there is masses of overtime rota'd in and no one, senior staff or F1/F2s have much time for research or the extra things that get you a training place. What they get instead is lots of very good hands on experience working under supportive seniors.

DD is spending today batch cooking. Her final rotation is a good one, interesting and demanding, so she feels she needs to stock up on food, so she can give it 100%.

@Needmoresleep F1/2 don't get a day off a month for training. Supposedly there's a day once a month where training is given for an hour but v often cancelled as too few staff.

This is true of all F1 posts?