One of the great difficulties of an ER like Lonnie is that with the vast majority of the staffing being provided by fly-in-fly out Docs, when something happens to affect staffing there is no slack in the system. So, an illness in either a consultant or a Registrar leaves one with no backup (the administrative doctors seem to have no interest in helping with clinical coverage. It's quite entertaining to see the medical director wandering through the department with a bunch of "suits" chatting, bulshitting, and checking the dust in the air ducts - while we're short one consultant and two registrars and there are twenty in the waiting room.) 3 evenings ago, the charge nurse came to me in near tears - just didn't know what to do. We had no beds, no place to put another patient, and were at a complete standstill - about 20 waiting , with a few ill (unwell in Australian) but mostly minor complaints. Our only hope was that many would give up and go home - which was what ultimately happened.
As best I can tell, the underlying problem is one of this pattern (apparently widespread throughout Australia, except in the largest cities - all 7 of them) of fly-in-fly-out. The Docs apparently like it (the guys tell me that they make much more in their locum jobs than they do in their permanent jobs). But, it leaves most hospitals with nobody to keep pushing to get the system to work, and of course, no way to take up slack in case of an emergency - whether a crunch situation, or a staff illness.
Anyway, because of all that I've been working far too many hours and under far too much pressure. And, have had no time nor energy to keep up the blog.
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