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Crosscat's avatar

I completely agree with everything you said. I qualified in 1992, became a GP as quickly as I could to escape the bullying of hospital work, and then gave up in 2002 using the excuse of having 3 children. The hardest thing I’ve ever done is manage to keep turning up for work every day of my general medical, teaching hospital, house officer job. I couldn’t believe the bullying and couldn’t understand how every, supposedly brilliant, doctor put up with being treated like this. And why was it necessary? Just because our superiors had been bullied, they had to pass it down to us? I used to fantasise that perhaps I should commit a crime, because then I could go to prison and then I’d get sleep every night, regular meals, and I didn’t think the bullying could be worse!

I hated every day of my working life and would cry the night before, often. I had friends that would throw up every morning before they were ‘on take’ as SHOs or registrars. I did have some nice Consultants, but I remember at the DGH we had 6 obs & gynae consultants and only 5 SHOs. The point was that one consultant thought us juniors to be so useless that he didn’t need one and he would use midwives in our place. This was fine unless you happened to be assigned to his ‘take’. I remember admitting a patient, doing all the tests and starting the antibiotics ( as I’d been taught by other nicer consultants) and when I told him about it, he launched it a tirade of abuse, shouting at me in front of the whole ward, all the nurses and the patients in the 6 bed bay, that ‘how dare I start treatment’ (remember others would shout at you for not starting treatment) and reduced me to red faced, tears pouring down my face, wreck. He was also an examiner for the DRCOG which I sat (annd passed), and had written a textbook.

There was an ophthalmologist who I worked for as a joint ENT & ophthalmology SHO in the DGH. One evening I saw a man from the nearby RAF base who was quite high ranking, but presumably had children my age as he stood up for me! I told him I was ENT doctor just covering ophthalmology, so I could examine his eye but then I would need to call the consultant on call, which I did. The consultant didn’t rush back in so I apologised to the man for the wait and said I had called the consultant. When he finally turned up he examined the man and said he clearly had uveitis and couldn’t I see it. I looked through the slit lamp and couldn’t see what he was describing (maybe because I wear contact lenses and my vision isn’t perfect, so it might not have been in focus - trust me those tiny flecks are hard to see) and he got really cross with me. The man ( in his uniform) spoke up and said ‘it’s not her fault if she can’t see it’ and humbled the consultant. I was forever grateful for that patient.

I knew I had to give up working from my last years in clinical school but felt I couldn’t because ‘what else could I do’, ‘I might as well qualify now I’ve been through so much already’, and ‘I should at least qualify as a GP so I can work half time and maybe I won’t hate it so much’, and ‘after putting up with all this I should at least earn some money from it’!

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Ann Bennett's avatar

That makes so much sense to me Doc!

I'd like to see doctors trained on a more practical basis, starting by studying part time and spending time working on hospital wards along side nurses, then gradually working their way up. I'd like to see nutrition and natural health management included in training, as well as lifestyle and environmental factors.

I am completely opted out of the National Harm Service and it's going to take an absolute miracle to make me trust it again.

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