It says the practice pre-dates Covid, but that some hospitals may have expanded working hours to deal with current requirements.
The executive says rosters may involve a doctor being on-call for 24 hours, and that it should be designed in line with EU regulations.
The European Working Time Directive states every worker should get a minimum of 11 hours rest in a 24 hour period.
dangerous for our patients and dangerous for us. 2) It has taken a lot of work to change that bullshit macho culture in medicine in Ireland #IMO. 3) Medicine is MUCH more complex now than even 5 years ago, in innumerable ways. 4)#24nomore should be #nomore24. Now more than ever
— Tom McEnery 🇺🇦 (@mcenery_tom) June 20, 2020
Dr John McFarlane, from the Irish Medical Organisation, says the practice is inappropriate:
“The European Working Time Directive should be respected in terms of, you know 13 hours is supposed to be the maximum working shift, after that performance drops off and people are more liable to make errors.
So I think 24-hour shifts are too long, you know in terms of both doctor wellbeing and patient safety.”
