National Director of MTAS resigns

The national director of MTAS has resigned. Read the full text of his letter.

MTAS rescue survey

ASiT are asking for your opinion on how to go forward on selection of surgical trainees following the MTAS collapse. Please respond to the survey and make your opinion heard!

New tutorial on Appendicitis

We have published the first in a series of new articles aimed at ST surgical trainees. This one is on appendicitis and is to be followed by topics including hernia, lower limb ischaemia and colorectal cancer so keep checking back.

If there are topics you think you could contribute then please contact us with details.

The government and the Royal College of Surgeons have agreed a rescue plan for the massively flawed MTAS system. But this will only be for surgical trainees.

Read the full story

Government Review of MTAS

A review of the whole MTAS system has been announced today.

Read the full story on Surgeons Net

The shadow Shadow Health Secretary, Andrew Lansley has said:

"The Government has waited until thousands of junior doctors were in
despair about their career before they understood the need for
action. They have badly mishandled the recruitment process."

"We called for the process to take account of the large number of
junior doctors requiring posts this year. The Government clearly
failed to do so even though they promised sufficient places last year."

"This review must now be rapid. It must consider whether additional
training places should be provided and it must allow for thousands of
junior doctors from the UK who have not received first round"
interviews to be considered afresh in the second round.

West Midlands Deanery Cancels ST3 Interviews

The West Midland deanery has cancelled all ST interviews today after the resignation of the interview team.
I have posted the full statement http://www.surgeons.org.uk/latest-news/official-west-midlands-deanery-statement.html

I actually, think this is a real shame. The assumption though out this MTAS mess is that the wrong people have been selected. I personally think that they should have continued with the interview process and if those short-listed didn't come up to scratch then they should not have appointed and the posts not filled. Yes, lots of good people haven't been short-listed, but does that automatically mean that none of the short-listed candidates were right either?

Early Day Motion 737

I posted earlier on Surgeons Net about the recent round of MTAS recruitment.

• http://www.surgeons.org.uk/general-news/bma-calls-for-delay-to-shambolic-recruitment-system.html
• http://www.surgeons.org.uk/general-news/protest-march-against-mmc.html

Well there are a number of MPs that have taken up the cause too, angered by the rushed implementation of the MMC changes. It is true to say that the old system may have required revision. However, there has been no pilot or validation of the new system and there appear to be examples of inequaties all over the place. Even if the new system has selected out the right people it has created disillusionment and a further drop in moral. Write to your local MP and get them to support this motion too.

Try 8 hours before 24 hours Mr Blair

Various papers (The Times, The Sun are just two)reported a story of Mr Blair's and Ms Hewitt's plan of 24 hour operating in NHS theatres. This is to try and reach the target of reducing waiting times to 18 weeks.

This is exactly the sort of thing that shows just how disconnected the government is from real life. The current situation in the NHS is that you have to have your operation within 6 months, but cash strapped PCTs and trust are delaying operations on financial grounds so that there are minimum waits in place. Often these are minimum
waits of 5 months!! So theatres lie idle at the moment and they want to extend the idle time by three times. How can this possibly make sense.

And who is going to staff these 24 hour theatre sessions and how is this going to be funded. I have rarely done a theatre list where a patient hasn't been cancelled for administrative reasons. The NHS hasn't even sorted out how to use 8 hours efficiently, forget about 24.

It's all my wife's fault

I was actually going to title the blog "It's all my wife's fault"

Now I am not talking about everything, just why I'm here. I think she has had enough of me coming home and moaning about the various problems within the NHS and one day she said why don't you start a blog about it. Hence I'm here.

I also run a Surgical Website and so thought I would kill two birds with one stone and publish my progress in developing that too.