Sir, – I support the NCHD campaign for safer working hours. The long shifts, stretching to three or four days, endured by my generation of doctors, should not be revisited on younger colleagues.
Rosters for NCHDs in emergency medicine (EM), have long been compliant with European Working Time Directive. The challenge lies in making “non-EM” specialities compliant. A proportion of patients who attend at emergency departments require review by another speciality. I am concerned that the response of those tasked with making speciality rosters compliant, is simply to strip service to patients in the emergency department, especially at night time and weekends. Patients waiting in overcrowded emergency department truly do not deserve this additional blow.
Can I ask that the Labour Relations Commission include in its decision an instruction that all proposed roster changes are interrogated to ensure that the care of patients waiting in emergency departmens is not further delayed? – Yours, etc,
EMILY O’CONOR MRCPI,
FCEM, Consultant in
Emergency Medicine,
Connolly Hospital,
Blanchardstown, Dublin 15.