Junior doctors at risk from exhausting hours

Cases of overworked junior doctors falling asleep at the wheel driving to and from work has prompted a union call to cut working hours.

At least seven junior doctors had fallen asleep at the wheel going to or from the job after working more than 16-hour days in the past 18 months, said Resident Doctors Association general secretary Deborah Powell.

In every case, the car went off the road. One vehicle was written off after hitting a lamppost, but none of the drivers was injured.

It was just sheer luck that nobody had been killed yet, Dr Powell said.

"Do we really have to wait until a doctor crashes across the median barrier driving home from Hutt and kills another motorist or themselves or a patient before something is done?"

Dr Powell said some junior doctors at Wellington and Hutt Hospitals worked long hours with heavy workloads, prompting the introduction of temporary measures to alleviate the problem.

Hutt Hospital junior doctors in surgery, orthopaedics and gynaecology regularly worked more than 16-hour days or 72-hour weeks. This included on-call time.

The doctors had complained to the union they were working unsafe hours, and they were scared for their own safety as well as that of patients.

As a result, patients arriving at Hutt Hospital between midnight and 8am needing surgery or gynaecological or orthopaedic care were now being sent to Wellington Hospital to give the registrars a rest.

Dr Powell said there was concern at Wellington Hospital over the long hours neurosurgery and cardiothoracic surgery registrars were working - their midnight to dawn shifts were now being temporarily filled by locums.

The union will meet Capital and Coast and Hutt Valley district health boards on Monday and examine several options in a bid to solve the problems long-term.

Dr Powell said the union had similar concerns at hospitals run by the Auckland, Southland and Taranaki district health boards.

"So it is not isolated, but one of the things that concerned us very seriously about the Wellington region was the workload that these people are carrying."

Hutt Hospital general manager Warrick Frater said trying to recruit more doctors was not the answer because concern centred on the amount of on-call time, and there would not be enough day work for extra doctors to do.

"I don't disregard the concerns of junior doctors, but there's a fine line between their training requirements and there being enough work for everybody to do."

- NZPA