8 November 2016

College President, Dr Suzy Lishman, has set out members’ concerns about morale and NHS funding to the Labour party’s shadow health team.

College President, Dr Suzy Lishman, has set out members’ concerns about morale and NHS funding to senior MPs in parliament.

Dr Lishman was one of nine medical royal college leaders at a roundtable with the Labour party’s shadow health team.

Newly appointed shadow health secretary Jon Ashworth MP said he had requested the meeting in the early days of his appointment to ‘listen and learn from health professionals and their leaders.’

On the agenda was what the medical royal colleges thought about NHS finances, workforce issues and morale.

In the wake of the junior doctors’ contract dispute the college leaders were united in their concern about the morale of doctors in training.

Dr Lishman said: ‘Over the summer we conducted a survey of our trainees and a large number of them responded. We found that 70% are thinking of working abroad, 60% are considering leaving the NHS to work elsewhere, in industry for example, and more than half are considering giving up medicine permanently.

‘Whilst recognising there will have been a certain amount of self-selection in those responding to the survey and that saying you are “considering” leaving is not the same as actually going, these are really worrying findings.’

If these considerations were translated into action it would be a ‘disaster’ for the NHS and it was important that trainees were better supported, Dr Lishman added.

On NHS funding all the college leaders agreed that the proposed £20 billion of efficiency savings is unrealistic and that whilst it is vital to be as efficient as possible the truth is that much more investment is needed at a time of increasing demand.

The leaders were particularly critical of the knock-on consequences of large reductions in social care and public health funding which meant that more people were requiring hospital treatment and then were stuck on wards because there was no-one to care for them in the community.

Dr Lishman raised concerns about pathology budgets being seen as an easy target for further cuts.

She said: ‘Pathology is involved in nearly all NHS patient pathways and the idea that you can safely cut services back when they are currently overstretched will actually harm outcomes and cost the NHS more money.

‘We actually need to invest in pathology services to improve quality and save money. If, for example, you invest in pathology you can detect cancer earlier which leads to a better outcome for the patient at less cost to the service.

‘Similarly an investment in finally delivering the National Laboratory Medicine Catalogue, which would standardise pathology test requesting and reporting would mean fewer tests, easier information sharing and money saved.’

The shadow health secretary promised to meet Dr Lishman to follow up the points she had made.

The meeting was part of the College’s increased engagement with politicians which, over the last year, has involved a series of meetings with Conservative health ministers and the health select committee chair along with politicians of all parties in Westminster and the devolved countries.