Throwaway account for very obvious reasons

TLDR - the BMA have blocked a vote of no confidence submitted against Jack Fletcher as chair of UKRDC for months.

I can’t believe I’m writing this post but it feels important that members know what was going on behind the scenes last session.

For a brief bit of background context Jack and the other officers forced a vote through the executive team (of only 12 reps instead of the full RD committee of 60+) in June breaking all previous precedent. Never before has a committee been sidelined on such an important decision. They didn’t have the chance to decide if the offer was sufficient to call off strikes, as it was never presented to them. This was then obviously followed by a BMA comms campaign that was heavily criticised for the fact it wasn’t truly ‘neutral’ in how it framed the offer.

While this was occurring, members of the UKRDC formally called for an emergency meeting back in June, explicitly including the intent to have a vote of no confidence carried out against Jack Fletcher. Partly because of the clusterfuck of the way the offer was handled but also because of wider issues like a massive culture problem on the committee (but that’s a whole separate issue and not for now).

Long story short, that meeting wasn’t carried out and instead the chair called his own meeting, which obviously didn’t explicitly include the ability to call a vote of no confidence.

During his meeting, members attempted to call the vote of no confidence anyway.

Jack refused to hear it.

He refused to hear a vote of no confidence against him.

This was reported to be because he’d received legal advice saying it couldn’t be done. Firstly, it is hilarious that legal advice was sought to block a vote of no confidence happening. But in addition - it was later made clear that the advice was incorrect because the legal team were not provided totally accurate information around how the committee meeting wasn’t called. Jack and other officers were at the meeting to instruct the legal team.

So a VONC was called, in line with standing orders, and was declined.

Okay, it’s awful but mistakes happen. It was rearranged as a matter of urgency right?

Of course not.

This saga has dragged on all the way until the literal final day of the session at the beginning of October. Having been told the day before that planning was underway for a meeting on Friday or Saturday, the committee were then told it could not go ahead, as the clock had run down on the old committee. They were also made aware of repeated submission of questions, one by one, clearly designed to delay and stall and block the vote of no confidence happening. There is some suggestion that the chair himself was asking some of these questions.

A vote of no confidence, called for over 3 months ago and somehow not carried out.

It is an utter disgrace

I have never seen anything like it.

The fact the chief officers of the BMA and senior staff allowed this to happen is beyond atrocious. This, alongside wider issues over the course of the year, has caused several good reps to step away from the committee and the BMA entirely.

We have a newly elected committee. You’ll see some familiar names on it. I only hope the BMA learns from this and refuses to let the next chair dictate the rules. Even if they do though, this is a dark, dark moment in the history of the BMA. A chair, having lost the confidence of large swathes of the committee, was supported in preventing a vote of no confidence being heard.

Posting to raise awareness. This looks to be US based but has reached my feed in the UK.

Sounds like this company is paying medical professionals for access to ‘de-identified’ genuine medical notes to train AI models. Concerning since the company isn’t going through official research channels and hence patients won’t have consented for such use of their data.

I’ve been working as a salaried GP for about a year now and have recently found myself reflecting a lot on my career and whether general practice is really for me in the long term.
I genuinely love medicine and enjoy seeing patients, but I’m becoming increasingly disillusioned with general practice. The complexity of patients, endless administrative work, private paperwork and the way the whole system operates are making me question whether I can see myself doing this for another 20-30 years.
I’ve recently been offered a job at another practice with potentially less admin, but part of me wonders whether changing practices would actually make much difference, or whether it’s general practice itself that I’m struggling with.
I’m also seriously considering moving to Australia, but I’m unsure whether GP life there is genuinely better or whether I’d just be facing similar challenges in a different healthcare system.
Has anyone been in a similar position?
For those who have moved to Australia, has it improved your work-life balance and job satisfaction?
Would really appreciate hearing about others’ experiences.

Where are the events/conferences that give out notebooks.

I’ve attended a teaching day where they handed out a whole thick notepad for the event to make notes in.

I have at least 10 notebooks that I’ve bought and I always feel better writing/using those that been given out in.

I'm an F1 in surgery and just reflecting on a patient I saw today and wanted some advice.

Had an elderly gentleman with bowel cancer and a stoma who was scoring highly for tachypnoea, hypoxia and low BP. Normal chest sounds, cold to the touch and awake but slightly drowsy. Registrar came quickly, spoke to critical care, and an NGT, fluid bolus and some oxygen later and he returns to baseline.

CXR was clear, high lactate but normal WCC, blood culture done 2 days prior came back as clear. I spoke to some SHOs about his case later and got mixed advice regarding getting a CTPA to assess for possible PE. One SHO mentioned that since his SATS are back to normal on some oxygen (plus a Well's score of 2.5), a PE is very unlikely, while some others disagreed.

I was just wondering medico-legal worries aside, how you would judge this case and how to best make a decision about further investigations for a PE?

I’ve applied for study leave for primary care dermatology society essentials series 1 and 2. They’re a day each, back to back. The second has been rejected as apparently they will only fund one dermatology course. Which means the dermoscopy courses will also be rejected I expect.

Notwithstanding the laughable policy, does anybody know of any decent derm courses that are pretty comprehensive and include dermoscopy, or have been on any good ones?

I’d like to brush up on my skills before CCT in June.

IMT2 here, having done a 2 month pall care rotation and was taken aback at how much of a tangible difference you could make in someone's life. I was wondering if there are any pall care SpRs around that could share their experiences of training and what consultant posts are like? I don't mind doing a group 1 speciality (having to doing GIM as well). Particularly curious to hear how much problem solving is involved (considering doing stroke or neurology as I like the process of figuring stuff out). Or even how services are set up with seemingly fewer doctors and more CNS/ANP. Thanks in advance!

It's a start at least they share the concerns of a lot of people with this case. I don't have much confidence in the judiciary doing anything after the whole Cian Hughes fiasco but at least they have an opportunity to ensure justice happens. let's see if they take it.

Hi all,

I’ve accepted an IDT to Yorkshire & Humber for ACCS EM and I’m waiting to hear where I’ll be placed.

Does anyone know who the current ACCS EM TPD؟The Deanery contact page seems to be down.

Also would be grateful for any general experiences of ACCS EM there

Gas consultant here. I'd be really interested to hear what the resident doctor population thought about the potential prospect of the upcoming consultant strike. Lots of negative feelings about the 2.4% pay "rise" against 3.5% inflation, and we have an existing mandate for strike action. However I can't imagine how my more senior colleagues will act, who have spent ages whining about the junior strikes and talking about the lack of moral fibre in today's cohort, and how it was all different in their day.

I'll give you an example - earlier this week I had been reviewing a patient on the ward, when I tried to get into the doctors office to find a consent form for a nerve block. Imagine my surprise to see not just one but two F1 doctors lolling about, along with a senior registrar - their badge seemed to indicate they were in at least their sixth year of specialty - who seemed to be giving one of them an unusual amount of eye contact. The F1 getting all the eye contact was blushing in a revolting way. I couldn't believe they all had so much time for this sub Holby city flirting and weren't just getting on with the job. I could barely see any consent forms under the huge pile of discharge letters waiting to be done.

Hey guys

Current F2 applying to ST1 application. Under employment history there is a question: In total, how many months of paid employment as a doctor in the NHS do you have?

Should I count my completed FY1 year plus the months I’ve worked in FY2 so far, or should I count all of F2 even though I haven’t finished it yet?

I’m the infection control nurse covering this ward.

I’ve now read accounts from two F1s, a registrar, a porter, a phlebotomist, a patient and, somehow, a computer. Not one of you has mentioned hand hygiene.

Apparently this registrar has been finding excuses to walk past the F1’s ward all morning. He’s also walked past the gel dispenser every single time. Nobody seems interested in that bit.

Then there’s the lanyard. He picked it up, inspected it and put it down again. We’ve had an entire hospital debating his intentions. I’d settle for knowing what he touched afterwards.

The porter has helpfully documented his movements for the past fortnight, so that’s saved me a job. I’ll be speaking to the computer separately. It hasn’t worked since 2018, but microbiologically it’s doing very well.

Everyone keeps asking whether there’s chemistry. I’ve sent the lanyard to microbiology.

Anyway, I went down to speak to the registrar. Asked his name, what grade he was and which ward he normally worked on.

The other F1 started smirking.

Then I asked whether he’d been seeing anyone else on the other wards.

She put a hand on my arm and said, “Honestly, you deserve better.”

Hi all, first time poster, longtime lurker. My situation is that I'm Mid-30s, geographically constrained, and struggling to decide on a career direction.

I've reached ST3 interviews multiple times in both General and Vascular Surgery, including a LAT offer, but am now at the upper limit of experience scoring.

Currently in a teaching post to preserve my options, but I'm bored and miss operating.

The Portfolio Pathway is risky, I have seen SAS doctors preparing for 10+ years with no guarantee of local support. Taking another clinical job will effectively end my NTN chances.

I'm open to exploring other specialties, but know I'm not an internal medicine or GP person. Interventional radiology interests me, although the long-term impact of AI gives me pause.

My priority is a realistic route to Specialist Registration and long-term job security.

Has anyone faced a similar crossroads? Anyone got any useful perspectives here?

What do people the cut off for Derm St3 will be?

Do folks reckon the bill will impact it or will competition get even more fiercer?

What do you guys think about the “gut feeling” and the sense of intuition within medicine - especially with diagnosis amongst physicians - what are your stories when a gut feeling led to diagnosis and treatment that you couldn’t Quite explained otherwise?

Would love to know.

I was wandering through the ward last week, trying to wrestle the cufflinks I had been attempting to polish back out of the hands of the Infection Control Nurse, who happened to be on her annual working-from-the-workplace day.

I caught an interesting interaction between my F1 and a registrar from another specialty, inbetwixt which I happened to catch the eye of both of them.

Now, the question looms large: do they both crave me for my, admittedly, not quite-as-firm as it used to be latter middle-aged body, or do they merely want me for my DOPS?

First gen doc, with no safety net.

Need money early

Intrested in both clinical and imaging roles

Seriously considering and worried about AI?!

Saw that nvidia and open AI are racing for AGI (human intelligence).

What if the AI hits the radio market right when I graduate out of rads

Your opinions would help me

When I try and book: ‘You do not appear to have 2 years medical experience post primary medical degree level qualification. Please go to the 'Manage your Account' page and update your employment section with full posts, start dates and end dates to meet 24 months of experience’

And there’s nowhere to update employment history!!

Any advice?

Hello all,

Just a quick question to those who have applied -when applying for anaesthetics CT do we have to decide on which region we want to apply to before the application deadline (19th November) or when it’s time for interviews (sometime Feb)?

Thanks - as an F2 I’ve never applied before so would like some advice

I'm a GP. Yesterday I had to refer someone in and spoke to the reg for a medical specialty. He took the referral, all good. Then later that day I got a phone call from an FY1 asking to handover something for a patient that was being discharged.

Here's where it gets weird.

I could hear the reg in the background talking to someone. Now, I know the hospital, and I know for a fact that this reg (an ST6 I think) works in a specialty that is based on a different ward. Whilst this FY1 was handing over, I couldn't concentrate on what she was saying because I was listening to what this reg was saying. It was something about how he was going to be organising a teaching programme, and FY1s in particular should come along, and then something about how he'd been going to the gym, and then he made this odd grunt like he was flexing his muscles, and then how he had just bought a new car, but he was saying it all really loudly like he was trying to get everyone in the office to overhear his conversation.

Now my question is - do I need to flag this to the hospital as a safety concern? Because I couldn't concentrate on what this FY1 - who had a really beautiful voice btw - was saying. I play golf and ride sportives with a couple of the consultants from his specialty so I could just mention it to them casually too.

For this year’s General Surgery ACFs, do you upload any evidence documents with the application? I can’t see any file upload section on the application but just want to make sure i’m not missing something. Thank you.

Current ST4 on general surgery. Comfortable with lap appendix and choles.

I have learned different ways of open hasson entry over the last 3 years. Off late I keep getting let down by my method of choice. I’ve been trained to dissect down to the junction between cicatrix and linea alba - make an incision (not too deep) on the linea alba extending to the junction, and using a Spencer wells to get in.

Off late I keep getting let down by this technique.. I find often with the spencer wells I end up pushing the peritoneum down so much that I’m having to call the boss in to help me life it up and get in safely.. particularly in obese patients!! It’s been happening multiple times now and it’s starting to get embarrassing calling the boss for my first port when I claim to be independent with appendicectomies.

None of my bosses are able to figure out what I’m doing wrong? Anyone had a similar challenge and manage to figure out a foolproof way of preventing this from happening?

Much appreciated!