Medical chiefs are stressing that anyone with a life-threatening illness or injury will still receive treatment at Plymouth’s Derriford Hospital during the 72-hour junior doctors’ strike. Bosses at the hospital said outpatient appointments and pre-planned procedures will be affected but patients should still attend for emergency help and even for other appointments unless contacted to reschedule.
Thousands of junior doctors today went on strike across England as a dispute with the Government over pay continues. The three-day walkout by medics – who can have up to eight years of experience as a hospital doctor or three years in general practice – runs until 7am on Saturday and is expected to lead to thousands of NHS appointments and operations being cancelled.
NHS chiefs warned that the number of people seeking emergency help will rise as the hot weather continues across the UK. NHS leaders have said that urgent and emergency care will remain the priority.
University Hospitals Plymouth NHS Trust this morning said: “We are working hard to keep patients safe during strikes, while delivering the best care possible. Patients should continue to attend appointments as planned unless contacted to reschedule.”
Paul McCardle, deputy medical director of UHP, said: “We have begun the job of contacting patients to postpone outpatient appointments along with some elective procedures. Of course it remains really important that you attend our emergency departments for serious life threatening conditions that need immediate attention. This includes persistent severe chest pain, loss of consciousness or altered confusional states, severe blood loss, serious burns, suspected stroke, breathing difficulties that are severe or deep wounds. Please help us get your relatives home if your relative is in hospital and ready to go, please collect them as soon as you can.
“Be aware if you attend our emergency department that you will be assessed but you might be redirected to another service if it is more appropriate to your current need. Please be patient, our staff will be working incredibly hard to care for you and other people there in the emergency setting.
“Please make use of other options available to you, such as your GP, your local pharmacy, or making use of our minor injuries units at Tavistock and Kingsbridge hospitals or the emergency treatment centre at the Cumberland centre in Devonport,” he added. “Our aim in our planning is to strike a balance between delivery of urgent care whilst ensuring life saving procedures can be effectively managed and delivered.”
The strike is the third this year by junior doctors in England and is expected to cause mass disruption. There have also been concerns about staffing, with some consultants saying they would not provide strike cover unless their employers agreed to a higher overtime rate.
The British Medical Association (BMA) is calling for “full restoration” of pay, which it says has seen a 26% cut. The Government has offered 5% to end the dispute. Dr Vivek Trivedi and Dr Robert Laurenson, co-chairmen of the BMA junior doctors committee, said in a statement: “Junior doctors are in despair at this Government’s refusal to listen.
“It should never have taken two whole rounds of strike action to even put a number on the table, and for that number to be a 5% pay offer – in a year of double-digit inflation, itself another pay cut – beggars belief. We have made clear that junior doctors are looking for the full restoration of our pay, which has seen a 26% cut. Junior doctors in England have seen their pay cut in real terms by more than a quarter over the last 15 years. Today they are demonstrating what that means to the survival of the NHS.”
A BMA poll of 1,935 junior doctors in England, published on Wednesday, found 53% are making plans to leave the NHS or are thinking about leaving as a result of the Government’s response to industrial action. Some 67% do not think the NHS in its current form will exist in 10 years and 88% expect the NHS to get worse over the next 18 months.
BMA chairman of council Professor Philip Banfield has written to Prime Minister Rishi Sunak urging him to intervene to resolve the dispute. Health and Social Care Secretary Steve Barclay said it is “extremely disappointing” that the BMA is going ahead with further strike action.
Want more news? Sign up to our bespoke newsletters here
Read more: