Sign in. It’s quick, free and it’s up to you.
An account is an optional way to support the work we do. Find out more.
JUNIOR DOCTORS ARE expected to vote in favour of industrial action in a ballot by the Irish Medical Organisation (IMO) today.
The doctors will be balloted on whether to take action over the lack of progress made on the implementation of the European Working Time Directive and other working conditions, The Medical Independent reports.
Earlier this year, Health Minister James Reilly said that bringing Ireland in line with the EU rules, which would end the practice of junior doctors working shifts of up to 80 hours, was a high HSE priority.
However the IMO has said that the government is now seeking an extra year to fall in line with the rules.
Speaking to the Medical Independent, IMO Director of Industrial Relations Steve Tweed said that junior doctors have been angered by recent comments by Health Minister Reilly on the government’s efforts to improve conditions. He said that the organisation expects a “substantial vote” in favour of industrial action in the ballot later today.
He also said that the IMO is in contact with the EU Commission regarding Ireland’s lack of compliance with the rules and was hopeful of a meeting later this month.
To embed this post, copy the code below on your site
Its very important that doctors get some rest and not be working the hours that Junior Doctors are expected to work. They need their full faculties when working so yes they are right to hold industrial action to change the way things are now. When a doctor is treating a patient they need to be fresh and not tired.
You’re dead right. Truck or bus drivers would be arrested for working them hours.
The fact that the ballot is to reduce the maximum shift to 24hours is crazy enough. Most people couldn’t imaging spending 24 hours straight at the office let alone 36 or even up to 80 hours straight like some doctors do.
Tom – the ballot relates to a demand for an *immediate* reduction to 24h, followed by full EWTD compliance shortly after. It’s not logistically possible to have EWTD across the board at present (it should be, but it isn’t).
We want full implementation, but realistically the awful conditions mean we don’t have enough doctors for that with current service structures.
Best of luck hope they get their entitlements .
Lives are put at risk when doctors work 80 hour shifts. O’Reilly is clueless, a politician with no regard for the welfare of our people. It’s hard to believe the man is a trained doctor.
Junior doctors get treated like crap in this country.
There’s a reason why we’re exporting our own and importing those seeking EU passports after 5 years. It’s time to put a stop to this madness.
Fair play to the junior doctors the slaves of modern Ireland. Absolutely disgusting the way there treated. About time they did something.
At least thats one strike i would support fully
I would fully support this. These are highly skilled men and women who dedicate their lives to helping us when we need it most.
I hate unions. I think of them as blood sucking vampires most of the time out to screw the country through blackmail.
But i must say that these Doctors are well within their rights to strike. Forced to work up to 80 hours a week is slavery, dangerous and unhealthy.
Back to the point. Conditions for doctors , especially our more junior doctors, in Ireland are terrible and in the case of NCHDs , unsafe. Unsafe not just for patients but also for the doctors themselves. How could stress and 30 hour shifts be otherwise. Stress and sleeplessness do not make for good training either. This situation has been allowed to continue because the professionalism of doctors to care for their patients has been taken for granted and in my view, abused. The issue of Working Time Directive has been around for a long time now and is a difficult one for the HSE and successive Ministers and governments but not dealing with it and allowing the exploitation of junior doctors is simply cynical and inept management. It’s clear doctors are at breaking point and will continue to leave in droves. So here we are again , back to crisis management in the health service in spite of the HSE, successive ministers and governments having years to plans for it. Time for James Reilly to act, if he’s up to it before we lose all our young doctors . Sound bites about league tables etc won’t do it . Improving working for doctors will. Do it while the is still time.
Working as a nurse for over 13 years I’ve seen the very long hours NCHDs work. How they survive on little or no sleep, and a snack if they are lucky, I just don’t know how they do it. Just hope you know your nursing colleagues support you.
I’m a supporter of the junior doctors but people need to consider that the effects of applying the EWTD to Irish hospitals is likely to have quite wide ranging effects on health services. I worked in the UK when it was introduced there. The first is that to make a hospital or on call rota EWTD compliant you need 6 or 7 juniors rotating. Lots of smaller Irish hospitals simply aren’t that well staffed. Even with 6 or 7 staff you need to introduce a partial shift structure (weeks of nights, weeks of evenings, varying start times etc) so that while its mathematically possible to make the job compliant it destroys continuity of care, removes almost any chance of formal training etc, because you rarely encounter your trainer.
In the end this may well be he death knell for quite a number of services in county hospitals and will make recruitment to other jobs impossible.
Isn’t the real problem that the role of junior doctor only exists as a training role? Many many doctors leave Ireland after training because effectively there are few permanent roles below consultant.
Joe, the country has had 20 years of warning about this. If the government have to close or reduce some services as a result of NCHDs demanding not to work illegal hours then that’s their fault – not ours.
I’m not arguing that at all, I agree we need to become EWTD compliant, but at least I can comment with some practical knowledge of the consequences having worked as a junior doctor in the UK when they introduced it there. You can’t have a debate without considering the whole picture. It may be a fact that some services and hospitals have to go, but this is medicine and that has to be planned.
You also need to look at union motivations. IMO are haemorrhaging membership at the moment. GPs feel let down because of the failure to deliver a new contract, Consultants feel that the government has used them as a scape goat for their own failings and IMO did nothing to defend them and everyone is pissed off at the George McNiece pension row. Best way to recruit from junior docs, the last major cohort of docs, is to threaten a strike where you will only be protected if your part of the union.
We need to become EWTD compliant and we need to close all public hospitals below a certain size.
Fine if you’re in Dublin, Cork or Galway. A bit of a problem if you’re in West Mayo, Cavan or Tipp and have a chronic condition requiring frequent hospital attendance.
Hey Joe what about Limerick?
Now here’s a strike I can get behind….
No government , no buses , no money in the banks , no doctors , no hash left in the country . What the flock is going on . Next you know me chickens will be infertile.
Ha ha good one
Fair enough I suppose, I would still cross their picket though, don’t judge me.
Junior Doctors have a just cause, and they are being treated in a disgraceful manner for way too long. Any money the Government are thinking of using so as bus drivers can retain their Sunday premium rates and rest days should be instantly diverted to help recruit more junior Doctors.
Why is that a reply to my comment?
You can cross their picket if you want to be treated after your car crash by someone who hasn’t slept for 32 hours and is basically hallucinating.
Okay, I’ll bite, what percentage of junior doctors work for 32 hours straight, no cat naps, no resting of eyes etc. It’s probably high but does anybody know.
Basically all of us at different points. In some specialties it’s a constant feature.
My point which I am making very badly is that, junior doctors always worked these hours so anybody joining the profession must have been aware of this. The response to this comment will consist of “well I hope you never have to use the service” to “what have you done for the country recently”. If you want to try and change the system then I wish you the best of luck, you have my indifference but not my support.
Steve, with respect, I still don’t get the point you’re trying to make.
People don’t become doctors for money or lifestyle. It is a vocation whereby you dedicate your life to helping other people through application of hard earned skills and knowledge.
Steve, EWTD has been around for getting on 20 years. Anyone who signed up since it appeared has been assured by countless administrative/government drones that the old fashioned working conditions would be gone by the time we graduated and started working. That has been a lie.
Who said it was about money, is it about safety? Is it about being treated fairly? This industrial action could be about a lot of things. How many of todays junior doctors will in 10 or 20 years will really care what hours junior doctors do then.
Significantrisk, if you put you faith in government drones then I’m afraid you were on a hiding to nothing from the start.,
NCHDs have historically worked even longer shifts than we do now, but did so in a vastly different healthcare setting, with a lower throughput, and lower expectations. A 30 hour shift today is much busier, populated with more unwell and more complex patients (ageing population) and with a much higher chance of litigation should you misdiagnose, or instigate the incorrect treatment.
I wholeheartedly support your endeavour but do not think in the past NCHDs have it easier. You are utterly wrong. On calls from Saturday 9 am till Monday 19:30 with 4 hours sleep. Weeks of 110-120 hours of which only 72 were paid. And as busy as now.
I don’t think the implication was that things were easier back in the day, but that the limited progress on improving hours has been offset by changes in expectation and the nature of the work. But I could be wrong
Please guys make sure you strike.. You have having the piss taking out of you!!!!
I mean nurses should be striking too.. But they’d rather play the martyr!
Well, after 10 years as a doctor, in a hospital-the person is probably in the middle of the registrar pay scale, a matter of public record, with another 5 years (or more if in a surgical discipline) to go before becoming eligible to apply for consultant posts, which on the new contract are €1100000 to €1200000 per annum. Pay scales increase with seniority because of the responsibility involved, as well as increased expertise and thus are not on a per-hour basis for consultants. Again, the ideal would be a consultant delivered service, with posts available to competitive trainees once training was complete, as outlined in the Hanly report. As this has not come to pass, someone has to pick up the slack, and in the hospitals of ireland, that someone is the NCHD.
Fair enough. My solution would be to reduce the pay of the high earners amongst the doctors (and other staff where applicable ) and use these savings to employ more doctors.
The incomes of doctors have been slashed already. The “high earners” have much better opportunities overseas (more money, better facilities, better working conditions).
The idea that making working conditions and pay WORSE will make doctors flock here is ludicrous. Iteland competes with other countries to hire and retain doctors – reducing pay here will only mean those countries need smaller advertising budgets for their recruitment departments.
I thought ye doctors didn’t do it just for the money? There obviously a staffing issue, so what’s your solution to get the required funds? Is it further tax increases or more borrowing then?
It’s not our job to figure out how to pay for us, there are at least 2 government departments to do that.
We’re expensive, there’s no way round that – but so are any other highly trained professionals in short supply.
John if I am doing less overtime then I getting paid less at overtime rates leaving more money free to pay more doctors at the normal rates. We are one of the only groups campaigning for something that will give us less pay not more.
But currently junior doctors dont get paid for all the overtime hours they work. Is it not true they can only get paid up to a certain amount of OT, but are still expected to continue to work for free thereafter…….
Tom like most things in this country it varies place to place. Some hospital departments pay no overtime, some all and some to a maximum amount
Can we have some details on senior doctors hours,maybe some investigation on how much you really make when established after 10 years as a doctor?how much can a doctor make if they are shareholders in private hospitals?drug company alliances,etc etc etc.investigate journalists.give us some answers,we know the money disappears somewhere,go on and have a look for us will ya???
Dr. James Reilly will only give us peace meal criticisms of his industry.
God that’s such a steaming pile of nonsense… If someone is a shareholder in a private hospital – that is a private business, not funded by the government, i didn’t think that would be hard to understand. They put in their own money. How is that any of your business whatsoever – somebody using their own skills and expertise to make money on the side – would you berate a teacher for giving grinds etc?!?
Drug company “alliances” are regulated very tightly nowadays so the only thing given is sometimes sponsorship to attend conferences or food for lunch meetings etc but there are no cash handouts which is what you’re implying.
After 10 years as a doctor you would be just finished your specialist training (depending how long it took you) – so you would either go fully private, or take the new consultant contract – the details of which are readily available online.
I feel a bit silly even replying to you as it’s such a meandering string of inaccuracies and lies, I do so just incase anyone else would read this tripe and think any of it was true. Please go and educate yourself on things
Why don’t you just look up the HSE pay scales, then add on all the overtime we work, then drop your “I think I’m onto an original line of questioning by asking what I think are pertinent questions”, then the discussion of “drug alliances” to your local conspiracy theory group
Haha,ooh touched a nerve ,if you want to treat the health service like your own private money machine that’s ok because the system has been twisted towards doctor welfare rather than patient care,that’s hardly fair to the people who pay for it,I don’t think anyone begrudges doctors doing nixers ,that’s in my mind is what the private system is,nixers.in any other job you would be fired for turning up late to work because you were off doing a nixer.
Our salary scales are readily available online.
As for how we’d be doing after 10 years – in the pitiful excuse for a training system we have here, most wouldn’t be finished training, or would have long since left for pastures greener.
This sort of anti-doctor bollocks simples piles on the incentive to leave, to work in places they appreciate the commitment, the efforts, and the massive sacrifice medical professionals make to take care of people.
See again you don’t have any clue what you’re talking about… The new contract doesn’t allow the consultant to spend time in a private hospital. And the consultants that do have time built into their contracts for doing that.
Not sure what exactly a “nixer” is but I assume its ditching work – that’s not the case.
I like how you say “ohh touched a nerve” – If you read my reply I basically made rebuttals to your points, and not particularly angrily, so no nerve injury here just clearing up the facts for others.
Just to make the point that the subject of this article is NCHD’s, their welfare and patient welfare most importantly… you’re ranting about consultant pay which has nothing to do with this really… so please wait for an appropriate article before you have your little tantrum again – this way it just looks forced. ;)
Im not anti doctor ,I think junior doctors should strike.i think if people don’t feel they are being valued by the state they should strike,being forced to leave the country is just a bit convenient for those who benefit from the status quo.it’s called sharing,ha.peace out doctors ,I love your work.and I totally agree,I know fu3k all.
So therefore don’t comment on it. That last statement was the most insightful you’ve probably ever made
Ha ha I guess you won’t be striking?
So to sum up, being established after 10 years a doctor must feel like having an atm machine in your sitting room. I personally think there should be pay cap of lets say 90 k€ p.a. on doctors pay. If you want to earn more just open your private clinic and provide a service the public pay will pay for.
The ‘new’ public consultant contract forbids working in both public and private hospitals.
Does drawing a good wage after finishing in the top 2% in the Leaving Cert, completing a six-year undergraduate degree course and then working like a dog for 10 years sound unreasonable?
have your say