By Chibueze Oyo
The crisis within NHS continues to grow as millions of patients are set to suffer poorer conditions to their care, unless the government comes up with “fresh ideas” according to UNISON general secretary Christina McAnea.
The Latest NHS vacancy statistics show that there are around 110,000 unfilled positions across the health services in England. These increased pressures mean that the country-wide understaffing issue and the substantial reliance on A&E services will further derail any efforts to clear the backlog of six million people awaiting non-serious surgical procedures.
According to a report published by NHS Digital, which tracks the latest quarterly data for the health service vacancies, the shortages include 39,652 nurses and 8,158 doctors. The shortages have been catastrophic for the industry, which is still trying to keep up with the backlog of patients that are awaiting treatment.
UNISON general secretary, Christina McAnea, warned early last month that the healthcare system will remain “broken” if the health minister does put no feasible actions in place. “Demoralised, overworked, underpaid staff are quitting the NHS every day. There’s a complete absence of thinking from ministers on how to hold on to experienced employees and attract enthusiastic new recruits,” she said.
Burnout across the NHS
The current workforce burnout across the NHS and its care systems presents a very worrying image to the eyes of the public as it puts at risk the future functions of the service. According to NHS Confederation, which represents the whole healthcare system in England, Wales, and Northern Ireland, there has been an increase in the number of hospitals calling a “critical incident” – a situation that occurs when your trust does not have enough staff to run its services effectively as normal.
Deborah Farse, Ward Manager at Royal Free London mentioned how tirelessly the nurses and doctors have been working.
“I know a lot of nurses and doctors have been feeling extremely undervalued in recent times, especially with all that’s going on,” she said.
“The staff has been under a lot of stress, continuously having to juggle roles due to staff absence or unfilled positions there are constants pressures at play. The issues in healthcare have been long present even prior to the pandemic.”
Former Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt told the government that it had “missed an opportunity” to relieve some of the pressures which the workforce was facing specifically in the NHS and Social Care after rejecting the Commons health select committee’s recommendation to overhaul workforce planning. Staff shortages were the main driver of worker burnout, he said.
Workforce crisis continues
Joan Okonafor, 24, a Junior Doctor at Kings College London, spoke about the importance of government intervention before the industry turns sour.
“I think it’s crucial that the government eventually offers better support to the NHS because almost all departments across a range of trusts are already overwhelmed, from A&E departments right through to GPs,” she said.
“Working on different wards I shadowed doctors on the frontline, and I saw how overwhelmed doctors and nurses were. It should be a national focus to revitalize the NHS and get it up and running to a capability that it should be.”
As the NHS struggles to employ and retain its staff, the Government will simply have no other option than to intervene, unless they want to run the health service into the ground. The workforce crises continue as 400 NHS workers leave the trust every week to try and regain a work-life balance.
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