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Time off

Correspondence to:
Correspondence to:
Dr Malcolm Bateson, Bishop Auckland General Hospital, Cockton Hill Road, Bishop Auckland, County Durham DL14 6AD, UK;
batesonm@smtp.sdhc-tr.northy.nhs.uk

Keywords: working patterns; doctors’ working lives

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

Managers are keen to develop the 24/7 philosophy in the NHS, realising that many facilities, overburdened during the 9–5 day, are empty or at least underused for the majority of the time. Operating theatres, secretarial offices, and outpatient clinics tend to be deserted at night and weekends, and many departments such as radiology and technical laboratories offer restricted out-of-hours service.

We are bidden to adopt flexible working patterns to use accommodation better, for example evening clinics and weekend operating lists. There is a mood to provide fuller support services out-of-hours.

However, it is simultaneously the case that the European Union and government are concerned about the culture of overwork, which is a curiously British phenomenon. The idea of the 48 hour week seems a pretty distant prospect to most clinicians. Indeed the new prospective consultants’ contract version of this is that doctors will work at least a . . . [Full text of this article]