Doctor training programme hits A&E
Updated on 25 September 2009
The body representing doctors who work in hospital emergency wards, warns they will need more training to treat patients unsupervised in future.
The College of Emergency Medicine believes the training programme introduced to fast track its doctors to consultant is too short.
In 2007 specialist emergency medicine training was cut by a year.
Now the European Working Time Directive has reduced the number of hours doctors can work - doctors say they need that extra year back.
A&E consultant Dr Jalal Maryosh said: "It is better for our trainees to spend more time, because by seeing more patients, even if it is the same scenario, they will get more experience.
"So the training will be a lot better... and that, in the end, will be better patient care."
Commenting on the changes which have prompted today's call for an extension to the length of the training programme, Don MacKechnie of the College of Emergency Medicine said: "The changes have obviously all come gradually over the last few years.
"But the last step in that reduction is from 56 hours per week to 48 hours a week, and that final step, we feel, has led to this application to increase the higher training from three to four years."
"We've just lost too many hours out of the system for the trainees to acquire those competencies they require to become consultants in the speciality."
Reponding to the call for an extension to the length of the training programme, the Department of Health issued the following statement - "There is no evidence to suggest that training has been compromised through the introduction of the working time regulations.
"One of the key principles of Modernising Medical Careers is that no doctors training can progress unless they are signed off and certified as competent. Hours are not the measure for training."
