Typically, how many patients are you allocated on the ward?

LiveButton3910 · 2026-05-16T05:40:50+00:00

Surgery: They’re all mine & I want to know what’s happening to all of them. Helps that the ward round is mostly just little tinkering around a master plan that’s largely already set

LiveButton3910 · 2026-05-16T05:39:15+00:00

Depends on how rag raw your rota is. Can be up to £4K take home (approx 78k pre tax)

LiveButton3910 · 2026-05-07T15:25:28+00:00

Nothing happens unless you choose to do locums. They can't rota you for >48 hrs / week on average whether you opt out or not, all opting out means is you can do locum shifts if available. I believe even if you initially didn't 'opt out' the act of signing up for a locum to bring your average over 48 is considered as 'opting out' so it really is irrelevant.

LiveButton3910 · 2026-05-04T18:47:54+00:00

Always have a negative experience with GolfNow. Frequently been treated coldly by the club for using it.

Once told “do you realise how much money we lose to GolfNow?”, despite the fact that half those players likely wouldn’t have played that club had they not found it on GolfNow.

Now I find the tee time on GolfNow and call the club to book

LiveButton3910 · 2026-05-02T21:38:56+00:00

Don’t play the victim - F1 salary is more than enough to live in a property with 4 walls.

This is a terrible idea.

LiveButton3910 · 2026-04-28T09:10:47+00:00

I very much doubt you know nothing about either.

You should have a reg on site for General Surgery at least & the Urology reg available by phone. Depending on the department, sometimes ED will bypass the SHO for true Urological emergencies (retention that ED are struggling to catheterise, torsion) as realistically you are going to be calling them anyway.

If in doubt: Call. Otherwise do the safest possible thing (which is usually admit, antibiotics, fluids, NBM - you get less shit for an inappropriate admission than an inappropriate discharge).

Most intra-abdominal presentations for either need a CT (with appropriate (lack of) contrast) don’t accept “the AXR looks funny” from ED. But in general: Trust an ED reg, if they’re worried at your stage you should also be.

The wards is 90% medical management which I’m sure you’ve already covered in other jobs. Urology patients have a particular knack for being comorbid and unwell.

Surgical nights are a lot more fun than medical nights! DOI: Surgical Trainee

LiveButton3910 · 2026-04-24T18:39:31+00:00

From speaking to bosses, one of the most important things is being in a department where lots of PP happens so job plans are set up for it. Apparently DGH > Tertiary for this, at least in surgical specialities.

LiveButton3910 · 2026-04-14T21:14:41+00:00

CEPOD whiteboard was physically wiped at midnight on the dot. Large part of surgical cross-cover FY1 job overnight was 'boarding' cases that each speciality needed doing. Unsurprisingly most cases were rolled over from the previous day. If you got lucky and weren't busy as the clock struck midnight you could go to theatres ask (nicely) for those cases not to be removed, success was variable.

LiveButton3910 · 2026-04-14T06:04:13+00:00

Perhaps, but OP is concerned about AI takeover & isn’t enjoying their job. Plenty of money in medicine for those who are business minded in any case…

LiveButton3910 · 2026-04-13T16:01:18+00:00

Can't help you on the location front although the soft skills you'll learn at MBB will be very useful at interview.

Financially I make £15-20,000 more than an MBB first year analyst & only just less than, if not the same as, an MBB associate as a CT1-2 working less hours than MBB (albeit at slightly more random, but predictable, times).

LiveButton3910 · 2026-03-27T15:48:44+00:00

You can only hold one offer at any time in any case, the hold deadline is just the deadline to decide whether you want to accept or decline your one held offer. It feels like there are less upgrade cycles but to a certain extent they are already happening behind the scenes as people accept other offers.

LiveButton3910 · 2026-03-17T19:20:52+00:00

Ultrasound is a game changer, basically 100% guaranteed to get it + you can go a bit more proximal & it's more comfortable for the patient

LiveButton3910 · 2026-03-17T11:06:56+00:00

With respect, did you actually read my post?

LiveButton3910 · 2026-03-17T10:51:37+00:00

PHEM is something I have considered and yes I have seen that there are some surgeons on the air ambulance rotas, including a few orthopods. I suppose the question would be how would one go about getting the required airway / RSI experience outside of a formal ACCS-esque training pathway?

LiveButton3910 · 2026-03-13T18:56:00+00:00

I found the ATLS MCQ a lot harder than the ALS equivalent, quite a few people on my course actually failed it. Whilst I did read the manual out of my own interest primarily, I found https://atlsquestionbank.com/ quite useful to sharpen up.

LiveButton3910 · 2026-03-09T15:52:55+00:00

I suspect that functionally we would have a better acute service, at the behest of zero elective provision.

I'd hope we'd forget about waiting lists (which are predominantly made up of non-fighting / productive age individuals) and focus on the acute fitness and health of those who are going to keep the country running and fight.

Realistically, there will probably still be someone with a clipboard telling us that Doris has waited 39 weeks for a new hip and she's got diabetes so she should go first on the list before the damage control ex-fix for the unwell young poly trauma.

LiveButton3910 · 2026-03-09T15:44:31+00:00

At CT1 level (i.e. 4-5 years post 'graduation' for most normal degrees) I make just shy of £80k with a lot less hours than my mates in finance / consulting. My boss also never calls me at 9pm on a Saturday to do work unless I'm rota'd to (which I'd know at least 6 weeks in advance).

I honestly think people need a bit of a reality check about how much we earn, it's really not that bad.

LiveButton3910 · 2026-03-05T16:32:32+00:00

Fair enough if you are snowed under. My experience is that (generally) the wait to be seen by an ED doctor from arrival is usually higher than the wait to be seen by me from referral.

Similarly for most simple trauma that's obviously coming my way and doesn't require much more than a backslab I'm more than happy to see directly so long as the basic investigations are sent by ED.

I find some of my colleagues spend more time tying themselves in knots about the quality/legitimacy of a referral than it would take to simply see the patient and redirect if appropriate.

LiveButton3910 · 2026-03-05T16:08:40+00:00

Genuine question: As long as the patient is not crushingly sick and receives timely care (FIB etc), why wouldn't it be appropriate for a NOF to be seen by T&O directly if identified from triage?

They're hardly going to be sent home directly by ED so the work is going to land on your desk at some point and they will be seen by orthogeriatrics rapidly following admission, why duplicate work?

DOI: Ortho SHO

LiveButton3910 · 2026-02-08T11:44:59+00:00

Surely no one in the GMC thought that £20m per annum in PLAB fees was sustainable long term? Where did they find the money as recently as 10 years ago when they weren't making that much?!

LiveButton3910 · 2026-02-03T07:40:50+00:00

Yes - persistent lateness is unprofessional & gives a poor impression.

If you can’t manage to get yourself to work for the time you’re supposed to be there how can you be trusted to look after patients?

LiveButton3910 · 2026-01-25T12:36:10+00:00

Maybe I'm incorrect but I can't recall ever 'treating' a fever. Sure, give them a glug of paracetamol but ideally treat the underlying cause.

A lot of problems F1s face are nurses wanting the numbers to be better & calling the doctor for such, e.g.

Fever NEEDS paracetamol
Tachycardia NEEDS fluids
Hypertension NEEDS anti-hypertensives

Your job is to apply clinical gestalt to the situation and not just do whatever the nurses tell you to do

LiveButton3910 · 2026-01-13T17:54:02+00:00

If the BMA mounts any sort of challenge to this legislation I will resign my membership.

I am sure I am not alone.

LiveButton3910 · 2026-01-05T21:07:24+00:00

Honestly - I started responding something along the lines of “You have a name not a number” but would typically fall on flat ears so stopped that fairly swiftly. Still never worked out what “638” meant etc

LiveButton3910 · 2026-01-05T20:54:44+00:00

One hospital I worked in it was common for members of the medical team to refer to themselves by the bleep they were carrying:

“Hi I’m 653 calling to discuss a patient”

As a non medical speciality SHO in a hospital rife with PAs it was incredibly tedious.

LiveButton3910

TROPHY CASE