December and January have been particularly torrid. An early and unexpected Group A Strep outbreak resulted in huge pressure on paediatric areas, and then the predictable ‘twindemic’ of flu and COVID resulted in extraordinary exit block and hideous crowding.
It’s a pleasure to begin this crucial means of communication, with this post for Members and Fellows in Scotland but no doubt of interest (hopefully) to all members, as we progress through the most difficult winter our young(ish) specialty has faced. Ensuring you all know what we are doing to advocate for better, safer, and more
December is traditionally a time of celebration and I hope you are all able to get some time off with your families during the holiday period. Like many of you, I will be ‘celebrating’ Christmas by working overnight on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, our patients’ illnesses and injuries are no respecter of the calendar.
I travelled up to Birmingham for the Conservative Party Conference and attended a health event led by the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care. The event was in a small hot, noisy room overfull of people lobbying anyone in government, a good analogy for emergency care. Finished with a nice dinner with Luke and Pooja…
Adrian Boyle, EM Consultant in Addenbrooke’s Hospital Cambridge, succeeded Katherine Hender-son as President of RCEM at the AGM held on 4 October 2022 during the Scientific Conference in Belfast.
This will be my last EMJ supplement as President. I have been reflecting on the three years and on the questions, I get asked regularly; have I enjoyed my time, and will I miss it? It is a huge honour to be elected President…
The past months have seen significant work here at the College to address the issues that led to the examinations results error for the March diet of the FRCEM SBA. Before explaining what we have been doing, I think some context is useful, at the risk of recapping what we have already said before.
In this blog RCEM Vice President, Lisa Munro-Davies looks at the the history of Advanced Clinical Practice, the latest national developments, and what the future might hold.
In this briefing from the RCEM Policy Team, we explore what NHS England set out to achieve with the UEC Recovery 10 Point Action Plan, and how well it has fared.
In May 2022, RCEM published a policy report uninspiringly called ‘Beds in the NHS’. Despite the dull title, it attracted significant media attention, being a lead story in national media. As is often the way, the story was recycled into local papers giving us coverage in publications as diverse as the Milford Mercury, Grimsby Live and the East Lothian Courier. Unusually, there was almost universal agreement from all sides of the media that the NHS does not have enough beds for the work it needs to do.