I knew it was going to be a baptism of fire, but I don’t want to risk people’s health for the sake of my own education ‘The whole NHS seems to be teetering on a precipice.’ I’m scared, I’m exhausted, and I hate being a doctor. This was not the plan. Sat on the kitchen floor of our flat, tears poured down my face as my partner looked on, stunned and worried. My third day on the wards was over, and I never wanted to go back. I’d certified the death of my first patient – examining the cold body of a woman I had cared for, trying to forget that this was also my first time in a mortuary. I’d struggled to draw blood from patients who didn’t deserve my trembling, wide-eyed persona stuttering towards them with a needle. I’d welled up with tears as I sat in front of a computer trying desperately to remember how to prescribe a drug, paralysed with the knowledge of the harm that could befall my patients if I got it wrong. Throughout medical school, I had been told that my foundation years – the first two years of a doctor’s career – would be totally different to my training. I expected to be thrown in at the deep end, but I expected to be supported. I expected a well-oiled team around me, keeping an eye on me, never leaving me feeling alone. Sat at that computer – the only doctor on the ward on my second day in the job, praying no one would ask me anything – I was clueless, exhausted, and had no idea what to do about it. On our first day on the wards as new doctors, the more senior doctors were also new to the hospital. This was also the case on the second day. The well-oiled team was not there – it hadn’t even been created yet. After years of scribbling in notes, and learning to prescribe on neatly laid-out forms, I was faced with a computer system I’d never used, on which I was expected to request every test and order every drug. I barely spoke to any patients as I followed my consultant on the ward round. I then sat at the computer, and wished, as I ham-fistedly hit the keyboard, that I had learned to type properly as a child. I tried not to think about how the patient who had reduced fluid intake was still taking in more water than me that day. After finishing my jobs, which was only achieved two (unpaid) hours after I was supposed to end for the day, I did a quick walk round the ward, to make sure I hadn’t missed anything with my patients, to reassure myself that it was ok to leave them to the similarly overstretched night team. Patients and relatives seemed glad to see me, asking questions about their care, commenting on my having been there for 12 hours already (though none of them seemed surprised). That walk-around was probably the only reason I made it back in the following day. Having the chance to speak to the people I was trying so hard to care for, I was able to glimpse the reasons why I’d started my training – that I would help people, that I would learn from my patients, that I would make a difference. That night, my partner arrived home to find me passed out on our bed, still wearing my coat, my microwavable supper still in the fridge. I received my rota for this job three days before it started. Only then was I able to confirm whether I could attend my oldest friend’s wedding at the end of August. A week in, I still have no contract, and no one can tell me how much I can expect to be paid. My parents and partner are keeping me in food and rent until the end of August and my first payday, and I have no idea when I’ll be able to start paying them back. I hope and pray it will get better. We already know that gaps in rotas caused by understaffing are bigger than ever. The whole NHS seems to be teetering on a precipice, with everyone ploughing on, but unable to ignore that this is unsustainable without proper funding and better staffing. Many of my patients don’t need to be in hospital. They need to be in the community, where they are less likely to be stuck in bed for hours, less likely to contract the infections that, despite our best efforts, will always populate hospitals full of sick people. But social care is in even worse shape than the NHS, so we’re having to pick up the slack (and the cost). “It’s always a baptism of fire,” people tell me. “That’s how you learn.” But I don’t want to risk people’s health for the sake of my own education. I’m scared. I’m already exhausted. I’m not sure I want to be a doctor anymore, and I’ve only just begun. Source
