Early Risers.

[Gwiwer]

1 hour ago, PupCam said:

It is far too simplistic to say the NHS is great or the NHS is terrible.      There is a huge amount of fantastic work and care going on in the NHS under very trying circumstances

Absolutely.  

 

I have managed several face-to-face appointments since Covid first arrived.  With specialists and with GPs.  And also with the local asthma nurse.  But it hasn't always been possible within a reasonable amount of time.  Firstly because of the need to prevent the Wuhan Woohaa from spreading if at all possible and then because of the backlog of everything.  It's easier now although our local surgery still defaults to calling you back first and bringing you in if they think it necessary.  You can, however book appointments online or even walk in.  Online can be two to three weeks away if you want a specific GP or a particularly busy time of day but more like one if you will accept any GP at any time.  There are always a few urgent-needs appointments released at 8am that day.  

 

For out-of-hours there's 111.  They too can be busy and they triage just as many health providers now do. I got a call-back PDQ when I rang with an asthma-related issue because I answered the question "Are you experiencing any breathing difficulties" in the affirmative.  They then decide the best option which can be an evening appointment at an out-of-hours GP or at the local Urgent Treatment Centre.  If it's really out of hours (as in the small ones in the early morning) the option is a trip to A&E but the waits there can be above a couple of hours even so.  

 

With the exception of a couple of dragons on the GP's reception desk I have found every member of NHS staff to be going above and beyond to care in a timely and professional manner no matter how much pressure they have been under.  I also find the current system of ordering repeat medications online and needing only to pop into the pharmacy (which is barely 100 metres walk) to collect them to be far superior to the previous ring-the-surgery-get-an-appointment-see-a-GP-come-out-with-a-script-and-take-it-to-be-filled set-up.  Much more efficient use of everyone's time.  The pharmacist knows what they can and cannot give out without a GP authority and can prescribe directly in certain cases.  

 

I am also reminded of the treatment I had in Australia.  You pay up-front (and usually get a Medicare rebate of some of the cost) for all services unless using a "bulk-billing" medical centre or similar.  You get what you pay for: 10-15 minutes and a timed appointment with a GP for a $60 fee of which around $32 was rebated or 5 minutes after you have waited your turn in the queue which might be minutes but is more often hours long with a bulk-billing doctor.  I benefitted from the Medicare safety net which effectively caps the annual cost to the patient when treatment reaches a certain cost.  As a cancer patient I easily topped that threshold with every dose of radiation being charged at well over $100 and I had 30 in addition to consultations, surgery and extensive after-care for five years.  Aside from the cursory nature of some bulk-billed sessions where I reckon if I coughed I could have got a week off work everything was superb.  We even called in personally when we left Australia to thank our normal GP for the care given.  Something which he appreciated as much as we did his care and skill.  

[monkeysarefun]

1 hour ago, Barry O said:

What I cannot get my head around is the fact that things like spiders and snakes in Oz have to be removed rather than squidged. Is this part of a new "woke' culture in Oz @monkeysarefun?

 

Snakes are protected,  and more people get bitten trying to kill them than just letting them go their way or calling a snake catcher. I use my judgement when I see one, when I found  one in the aviary I called the Lara Croft lookalike, if I ever found any in the house or shed I'd get someone to deal with it but ones just sliding through the backyard I just let go on their way, they usually disappear before a snake guy gets there anyway. 

 

Huntsman spiders are harmless and its seen as a bit cruel to kill them, plus they DO make a huge mess if you squash them, like squishing a mouse or similar.  and fly-spray takes about 3 days to work on them. 

I'll kill a redback if its somewhere it shouldn't be like  in the house or shed.

Funnel webs you are encouraged to catch and take to a funnel-web drop off centre so they can  be milked. Funnel web milk is great in lattes. No actually its for that anti-venom stuff. 

[PhilJ W]

Evening all from Estuary-Land. I felt rather cold over the weekend and I only discovered why when I went out shopping this afternoon. I had for the second time forgotten to turn the double deadlock twice to close the door seals. The reason is simple, on both occasions I had to make a dash for the loo upon entering the house. Now I check the door is shut properly before I go to bed.

[New Haven Neil]

Just dropping before bed, worrying about our Bear.  Car blown up?

 

Oh, and GP surgeries aren't really NHS - they are private businesses that provide a service to the NHS.  Ours have all just been reviewed by the CQC, with some eye-opening failings. Ones which I can identify with, not unlike, but not as serious as Alan's.

 

With that, I'm off to my pit.

[Tony_S]

2 hours ago, Ozexpatriate said:

As have Kiwis with feral cats.

I got the impression from Aditi’s brother when he lived in New Zealand that possums (introduced from Australia) were considered to be a pest rather than a protected species. 

[PupCam]

24 minutes ago, Gwiwer said:

You can, however book appointments online or even walk in. 

 

Not here ...

 

24 minutes ago, Gwiwer said:

There are always a few urgent-needs appointments released at 8am that day. 

 

They are all "urgent-needs" appointments here hence the need for Puppers Patented 'ppointtment Procuring Procedure.     You cannot book appointments in advance either by phone, in person or online.

 

In the past, I have been unable to make an "Emergency Appointment" using the PPPPP because it didn't always work and they'd "Run out, try tomorrow".    I then phoned 111 was triaged, phoned back 20 minutes later by a clinician and after discussion she said and I quote "I've made you a telephone appointment with your GP for 11:30 this morning".   At 11:30 that morning the GP phoned ....   That's funny, because there were no emergency appointments available - they'd all gone for the day hadn't they?    I believe (I have no way of knowing how accurate this is so forgive me if I'm barking up the wrong tree) that the reason that there are so few appointments available at the GP's to book is because, either by instruction or choice, so many appointments are reserved for allocation by 111.   So, in such cases we've tied up two additional medical resources to achieve the same end - well that's not particularly smart is it!

 

On a subsequent occasion when I desperately needed to speak to a GP and the PPPPP had let me down and  cognisant of my previous experience I suggested to the receptionist that we could do this one of two ways;  1) She could give me one of their "Emergency Emergency Appointments" or we could all waste 111's time and resources by me phoning them, getting triaged, being phoned back by a clinician and then them making the appointment for me.   She then said " the doctor will phone you at ...."   Go figure as our American friends would say.

 

24 minutes ago, Gwiwer said:

For out-of-hours there's 111  .................. If it's really out of hours (as in the small ones in the early morning) the option is a trip to A&E but the waits there can be above a couple of hours even so.  

 

Used a number of times resulting in two all-night nocturnal visits to A&E in April '21 both of which suggested I needed a 24 hour ECG monitor.       

I'm still waiting for that monitor  to be fitted .....   but in late May '21 the need to try and see if anything was wrong was completely "overtaken by events".

 

24 minutes ago, Gwiwer said:

 I have found every member of NHS staff to be going above and beyond to care in a timely and professional manner no matter how much pressure they have been under. 

 

Not universally in my experience.   As an example; It took almost a year (yes that's right 12 months) for someone at Hospital A (no Names No Pact-drill and all that) to send a referral letter to Hospital B requesting a specialist's opinion on one of my conditions and requesting a special cardio MRI scan that Hospital A could not perform.  It took this time despite repeated and regular requests from both myself and the specialist nursing team looking after me (who have been doing a fabulous job and I tell them so every time  we meet).    When speaking to "a relevant person" I did get plenty of excuses that so-and-so has been on holiday, so-and-so is out for 3 days, I've been away for 2 days or that "It was in the "To-do tray" etc etc etc.   To add insult to injury when the letter was finally sent (I know this because I received a copy of it when it was) it did not appear to turn up at Hospital B and when I chased them up to find out what was happening they knew nothing about it because they had not received the letter!    Again, the very helpful person at Hospital B I spoke to asked if I could Email my copy of the referral letter to her and she would load it into the system. I did and she Emailed me back an hour later to confirm that she had received  and processed it.  I thanked her profusely for her help.     I finally had the scan last week .....

 

24 minutes ago, Gwiwer said:

I also find the current system of ordering repeat medications online and needing only to pop into the pharmacy (which is barely 100 metres walk) to collect them to be far superior to the previous ring-the-surgery-get-an-appointment-see-a-GP-come-out-with-a-script-and-take-it-to-be-filled set-up. 

 

As do I and I have a regular,  long list of medication every month handled in this way and it works very well  until intermittent variations (suggested by the specialist nursing team and advised by hospital letters) are required and then "the computer says no" which was in fact the reason for today's specific experience.

 

 

Frankly, we all know the system is well and truly broken but here is not the place to discuss the reasons why or who was responsible because I should imagine Andy's editorial pen would swoop into action very quickly indeed.    What is clear to me is that the best way to describe the service provided across the country is as "Extremely patchy", perhaps the very largest Curate's Egg there has ever been?       Clearly my experience is somewhat different to some others.

 

I have absolutely no idea how many hundreds of thousands of employees but it's a lot and I wouldn't mind betting that there's a distribution that can be applied "to the NHS work force" (by definition there's a distribution that can be applied to any group of people).   Whether that distribution is normal, heavily skewed, or whatever but to claim every single one of them is working at 110% , is dedicated to their task 110%, are particularly caring or whatever other criteria you wish to apply is I would suggest being either overly generous or naively optimistic.   If I'm wrong, the NHS  must be unique because no other organisation I can think of or have come into contact with has been so lucky in getting such a perfectly dedicated workforce.

 

As I said previously, there is huge amount of amazing effort, work, care being provided by a huge majority of NHS staff and I am always very careful to thank those that have contributed to my care BUT it's not universal.

 

Right it's time for bed but beforehand I have to do my nightly BP check.   I predict it might be a little elevated this evening.

 

Night All!

 

Alan

[BR traction instructor]

A disconcerting day that started with dropping the better half off at Carlisle station at 06.45…only for me to get a text as I headed back to the coast saying that her train had once again been delayed by someone leaping in front of it. 

 

The positive came later during an initial call to gas engineers in Maryport to arrange servicing of our boiler & cooker hob/grille/oven and being asked whether I would like the job done today. By 2pm I’d paid a very reasonable £105 and the engineer was leaving, having tested all of our gas appliances. We didn’t actually need the job doing so quickly but I wasn’t about to turn that opportunity down.

 

BeRTIe

 

 

Edited January 23, 2023 by BR traction instructor

[Tony_S]

 After the exciting morning of blood tests, tip trip and collection of prescription medication, I received a text telling me the tyres I  had ordered had arrived at the tyre emporium. A quick phone call informed me that they were not too busy. So I now have four new tyres fitted, TPMS serviced, and front and rear tracking adjusted. I don’t know how much the standard financial unit of a Deltic is but I suspect rather a lot of locos, even sound fitted ones, could have been bought for the final tyre bill.

[PhilJ W]

Goodnight all.

[Ozexpatriate]

1 hour ago, Tony_S said:

I got the impression from Aditi’s brother when he lived in New Zealand that possums (introduced from Australia) were considered to be a pest rather than a protected species. 

According to the NZ government:

Quote

The possum is one of the greatest threats to our natural environment.

New Zealand is interesting in that much of the ecosystem in other places that is occupied by reptiles and mammals is occupied by birds. Those that nest on the ground are easy prey.

[Barry O]

@PupCam.. yep. Its just like our Marie celeste.. trying to get a physical audience with one of our oh so busy they can only do three days a week to maintain their work life balance GPs demands an awful lot of low cunning.  And especially so when the oldest receptionist is on duty.. we are there to act as her staff...

 

I await some meds.. 4 weeks and counting. Transpires we can't get them in the UK as they are now being sold as weight reduction jabs... all over the world.. by those very helpful pharmaceutical companies. Just hope the non diabetics usibng them for weight loss know what to do when they get low sugar shock!  Obviously the NHS which has huge amounts of items sold to them are the wrong sort of customer...

 

Rant over but boy oh boy....

 

Baz

 

 

Edited January 24, 2023 by Barry O

[iL Dottore]

15 hours ago, jjb1970 said:

We flew with the low cost carrier (LCC) Jetstar. I find that LCCs are often a subject of hate because people judge them based on what they would like rather than what they are. We could have flown Singapore Airlines (SQ) and enjoyed good service, but for a 75 minute flight how important is that? Flying Trans-Pacific yes, but the fare difference between SQ and Jetstar was ridiculous.

I’ve never been a fan of low-cost carriers and only travel on them if there is absolutely no alternative (a recent trip to Edinburgh being a case in point as EasyJet was the only viable option).  I find that by the time you add up all the things you would like to have for the flight (checked in luggage, seating, something to eat/drink) you are closer to the legacy carrier prices, Not to mention that - with certain airlines (no names, no pack drill) - your destination airport is not actually near your actual destination (London Norwich for London perhaps???)

 

Having spent the most part of my career flying around the world for work, I have flown too much to go economy any longer and as my trips to London are planned well in advance, I can usually find a business class ticket for not much more than a standard economy ticket. The minor (for me) extra cost of flying business class Switzerland to London is more than outweighed by the advantages that come with that sort of ticket (no fighting for overhead luggage space, priority luggage handling, plenty of space onboard, priority bus transfer aircraft-terminal [at Zürich], food and drink, no sudden extra costs). Additionally, by flying from Zürich I can fly directly into London City Airport - obviating the need to fight your way through the Heathrow scrum to get through immigration and customs - not forgetting spending inordinate amounts of time [a] waiting for luggage and (b) getting into London from LHR. 
 

It’s pretty much a given that when I fly into LCY on a BC ticket from deplaning, going through immigration, collecting checked luggage to boarding the DLR it’s not much more than 20 minutes.

 

12 hours ago, monkeysarefun said:

Okay.... You got the mail in. "Ah ha! a package - that'll be the 1994 Iphone I ordered to replace my old phone!" you thought "I'll open that at the top of the stairs"  Which you did, but only to find that you'd actually bought "eye-phone 1994" an art installation by Tracy Emin, comprising a  dial telephone with sheeps eye glued to it, you fell back down the stairs in shock and landed on the heap of cakes and baked beans you keep there for when guests come.

I’ll have one of what Chimpey’s smoking….

12 hours ago, PupCam said:

It is far too simplistic to say the NHS is great or the NHS is terrible.      There is a huge amount of fantastic work and care going on in the NHS under very trying circumstances ….

I would agree. Medically, UK trained clinicians are considered amongst the best diagnosticians world-wide and some of the top cancer specialists in the world are British. However, the front line support and institutional structures (not to mention NHS management) is, how can I say it, “variable” to say the least.

 

Another factor that impacts on the NHS is the generally unhealthy state of the British - in one medical conference presentation poster from some NHS researchers, it was estimated that avoidable/preventable disease associated with what is termed “lifestyle” (smoking, alcohol and drug abuse, obesity, etc.) accounts for 40% of NHS spending. Something that adds to the stressors on the NHS.

 

In regards to NHS GPs, a considerable part of the problem is that there are too many part-time women GPs. My GP friend (who is English-Swiss) is particularly scathing about Women GPs - not because of lack of competence, but rather because of the fact that too many work part-time, splitting their time between being a GP and parenting. My GP friend is of the opinion (and experience) that being a GP can only be a full-time endeavour (incidentally having part-time female physicians and the problems associated therewith is something also seen across Europe - although with different issues than in the UK). So when you have practice with 10 GPs and a significant portion of which are - essentially - part time, in reality you have an understaffed GP practice.

 

Finally, two interesting and thought-provoking factoids: according to some sources the NHS is the world’s second largest state employer after China’s PLA; and the NHS remains the largest purchaser of fax-machines in the UK (if not the world).

 

Make of that what you will.

Edited January 24, 2023 by iL Dottore
Formatting

[New Haven Neil]

Morning, quite happily read the thread and moved on - forgetting to actually post.  D'oh.

 

7c and dry as it gets light, pecky birds having a good tweet, presumably no wind then.

 

Friend/ex-employee H coming around this morning for a train chat, he's also very computer-savvy so is going to have a look at the old PC to see if anything can be done to prolong its usefulness.  

 

Then the library after lunch, a walk, and it's chippy tea night too, yay!

[TheQ]

Mooring Awl,

5.5 hours sleep and that was it, brain wouldn't shut up.

 

First recommendation for extending the life of an old PC, fit a Solid State Drive, second add more memory.

 

The good news outside is no frost, according to yesterday's forecast we would be just north of the cloud coming from the south, therefore under clear skies. As it happens, we have 100% cloud cover, so a bit warmer. Still cool outside though we might reach a high of 5C!!

 

Ben the I want out Collie was a bit early, but went back to his pit when asked.  On patrol one area of the garden looks like a model of the battle of the Somme. Some animal has been digging holes about 6 inches deep a couple of inches in diameter. There are dozens of holes , I'll take a rake up there later..

 

Today's plans,

The pair of doors made yesterday will need a little finishing in preparation for painting, but we've run out of undercoat. Since SWMBO's birthday shopping trip is coming up, a can of paint will be obtained at the same time.

The rudder needs it's top face fibreglassing.

The centre console, needs part two of modifying to fit the hull.

As well as the area of garden needing raking, I'll dig away a bit more of the hump in the garden, maybe even finish that task..

And this evening the quarterly MRC meeting. Returning to the pub round the corner for the first time since COVID.

 

 

[grandadbob]

Good morning all,

Dull, dry and no frost here.  A mainly cloudy day with light winds forecast with the chance of one or two brighter spells this afternoon.  Slightly warmer at 2°C rising to 5 or 6°C.

Watched the last of 6 rugby matches recorded over the weekend.  A bit of an overdose to say the least.

Yesterday's walk of barely a mile resulted in Much Aching in the Knee and Hip.  The latter is still quite painful but I'll try another walk today to see if it can ease things.

Yesterday also saw me starting a diet to try to reduce an excess baggage situation in the waistline area.  I've been meaning to do it since Christmas but that bloke Will Power has been causing problems. I'm hoping that I can also increase my exercise but as already mentioned certain joints sometimes conspire to make that difficult.

Time for porridge.

Have a good one,

Bob.

Edited January 24, 2023 by grandadbob

[Tony_S]

2 hours ago, iL Dottore said:

y GP friend is of the opinion (and experience)

Thank goodness he has retired and left the NHS. I would personally hate to be treated by someone who had such views, no matter how competent they are. One presumes he didn’t have any children to distract him from his dedication to his work. This “they get trained, then have families” has. been used as an excuse to discriminate against women in the professions for too long.

Edited January 24, 2023 by Tony_S

[PhilJ W]

Morning all from Estuary-Land. Not a bad nights sleep last night but I woke up at five and couldn't get back to sleep again. The weather is going crazy with temperatures in southern England as low as -8C last night but in Scotland +12C at the same time.

1 hour ago, TheQ said:

Ben the I want out Collie was a bit early, but went back to his pit when asked.  On patrol one area of the garden looks like a model of the battle of the Somme. Some animal has been digging holes about 6 inches deep a couple of inches in diameter. There are dozens of holes , I'll take a rake up there later.

I had some similar holes in my garden a few years ago. The prime suspect was foxes as there was no other wild animal in the area. Muntjac only moved into the area during lock down and there's no evidence of moles.

[Tony_S]

1 hour ago, New Haven Neil said:

Friend/ex-employee H coming around this morning for a train chat, he's also very computer-savvy so is going to have a look at the old PC to see if anything can be done to prolong its usefulness.  

I did something similar recently. I had an “aged” laptop, in fact the one Matthew took to Leicester University in 2010. He had given it to me years ago when he replaced it with a Mac when he went to the LSE. It was capable of running the software I wanted  for my model railway hardware but was taking ages to start up. It was a bit frustrating at times but it is acceptable now. When it was new it was a very highly specified PC and the tasks,I want it for now are quite modest so really it was a case of removing stuff that wasn’t needed. Malwarebytes identified some stuff from 2013 it wasn’t happy with! In case anyone wonders why I didn’t install some other operating system instead of Windows, the reason was quite simple, the software for the hardware I was using only works properly on Windows. 
Tony

[Tony_S]

14 minutes ago, PhilJ W said:

some similar holes in my garden a few years ago.

We used to get squirrels burying nuts in our lawn but the holes were not 6” deep.  Aditi’s parents lawn in Nottingham was very popular with animals. They had moles that left piles of soil which FiL patiently transferred to flower beds and badgers that created all,kinds of holes as they searched for food. MiL didn’t like the state of the lawn, she wanted it tidy, but I think FiL quite liked the badgers!

[PupCam]

Morning All!

 

Woody has been after my nuts this morning!

 

Back later ….

[polybear]

12 hours ago, monkeysarefun said:

 

Snakes are protected,  and more people get bitten trying to kill them than just letting them go their way or calling a snake catcher. I use my judgement when I see one, when I found  one in the aviary I called the Lara Croft lookalike...........

 

Bear suspects you've got her number on speed dial......

 

11 hours ago, New Haven Neil said:

Just dropping before bed, worrying about our Bear.  Car blown up?

 

 

Freezing cold.....

 

1 hour ago, TheQ said:

Today's plans,

The pair of doors made yesterday will need a little finishing in preparation for painting, but we've run out of undercoat. Since SWMBO's birthday shopping trip is coming up, a can of paint will be obtained at the same time.

 

 

Buying SWMBO a tin of undercoat for her birthday.  Best of luck.....

 

16 minutes ago, Tony_S said:

.........and badgers that created all kinds of holes as they searched for food. MiL didn’t like the state of the lawn, she wanted it tidy, but I think FiL quite liked the badgers!

 

Bear would love a Bobby Badger in the back garden....

 

Bear here......

Up pretty sharpish to prepare for the arrival of the Plasterer - car moved, recycling bins moved, hose from the outside tap located and set up, hall cleared.......etc. etc.

And then a call at T-10 minutes.......

The Plasterer has a puncture - and the 20+ year old spare lives underneath the car.....and the nut that holds it on hasn't been moved in all that time.....

So today's Plastering episode has now slipped to Saturday.  Turdycurses.

Still, as he's (a) available, (b) walks the walk, and (c) his rates are very reasonable (a rare combination nowadays) it's no great problem.  It does kinda screw up progress for the rest of the week though.  Double Turdycurses.

So what to do today?  Dunno yet.  I do have a newly acquired collection of brass, nickel silver and white metal bits that need checking for completeness, so I'd better do that I guess.  Not great fun - especially trying to make it all fit in the box again afterwards.

 

In other news......

Bear has been slightly pondering the acquisition of a Display Cabinet for the Beary Lounge - I have numerous items of interest squirrelled away that seems a shame to be like that; items range from the obvious to Dinky Toys and a 1/8th I.C. R/C Car.  It'd need to be floor standing, no wider than 600mm (ish) and if the height is 120mm it'll mean a picture can stay put - though I can shift it for "the right" taller cabinet (the space would certainly come in handy).  Oh yes, and I need it to be dust proof....

 

Bear gone

[Tony_S]

57 minutes ago, polybear said:

Display Cabinet for the Beary Lounge -

We have occasionally looked at such things and “glass display cabinet” has been a frequent search item but nothing has ever come of the searches. The prices vary a lot for what often look identical but may in fact not be. Wooden furniture in our lounge is basically dark wood, in the dining room it is very pale wood so we have looked at a variety of finishes. Many are not even wood veneers and certainly not solid wood! I agree about dust proof. We have a few ornaments on the window ledge and mantelpiece and they do significantly add to the time it takes to dust. 
Tony

[Tony_S]

9 hours ago, Barry O said:

only do three days a week to maintain their work life balance GPs demands an awful lot of low cunning.

My nephew has just become a partner in the GP practice where he has been a salaried GP for a couple of years. He was only there 3 days a week as that was how much work they had for him, however in terms of workload he was doing the equivalent of 3.5 days as he did extra late surgeries as well. Another half day he was training. He has a PGCE qualification and has been training paramedics so they can take on extra tasks. The other day he works for another nearby NHS Trust on their out of hours support. There may be some adjustment of what he does as part of the partnership agreement but he isn’t just working three days a week,even if he is only visible at the practice three days a week. They have employed extra locum GPs to cope with the strep A outbreak. Josh didn’t seem too bothered that this will reduce the income available for partners, including himself.
He is not only the only male GP he seems to be the only male employee in the practice.

Tony 
 

Edited January 24, 2023 by Tony_S

[DaveF]

The cloud has gradually cleared and it is about 9C now.

 

Yesterday was a more normal day, though I still felt very tired and had a nap after lunch and an early night.  I've realised I have once again pulled a muscle at the front right of my chest and shoulder, there seems to be a general weakness in it - I think it is to do with writing on blackboards over many years.  I wonder if I could claim compensation?  It hurts most when walking and makes breathing a bit painful but it has done that on and off for many years.

 

In the morning I had a shorter than usual walk along the promenade so the day's total was only about 2.25 miles.  In the afternoon I had a long chat on the phone with a friend and then got the jigsaw puzzle holder and a new puzzle out.  I spent the rest of the day between meals, TV and so on making a start on it, it is surprising how quickly time passes once you get involved in it.

 

Various friends have reminded me that it is time I had a rest, so am trying to take their advice - it's not easy.

 

David

 

 

 

[iL Dottore]

4 hours ago, Tony_S said:

Thank goodness he has retired and left the NHS. I would personally hate to be treated by someone who had such views, no matter how competent they are. One presumes he didn’t have any children to distract him from his dedication to his work. This “they get trained, then have families” has. been used as an excuse to discriminate against women in the professions for too long.

Sorry, I disagree. Competence has to be the deciding factor in medicine (some of the best surgeons I know have been decidedly not  “user friendly”).

 

I think that’s there’s a fundamental issue that gets danced around too often, which is “if women want do Job X, should they not be expected to meet the same demands as made on the men doing job X?” If they can meet those demands, then great; but if not, then why should they be held to lower expectations/have lesser demands made of them than of the men doing the same job?

 

But it’s not just old blokes who feel that way: in some of the teams I’ve worked with I’ve noticed tensions between older women - who have made the same sacrifices as men to forward their careers - and younger women who are expecting to “have it all”. One senior female colleague bitterly remarked that the problem with the younger women entering the workforce is that they are expecting to “have everything, whilst sacrificing nothing”.

 

Furthermore, if it is unreasonable to expect women to (say) be available 24/7 for job “X”, should it not be also unreasonable to expect men to be available 24/7 for job “X”?

 

Quite bluntly, there are many careers where a “9 to 5, weekend with the family” life is just not possible - regardless of gender - especially at the beginning of a career. Perhaps more emphasis on that should be made to those contemplating such careers.

 

p.s. And, yes, my friend has children. Career first, family second - it’s a choice 

Edited January 24, 2023 by iL Dottore
Typo