08 August 2003
The NHS Confederation has called for a fundamental review of night-time health services after a study showed doctors waste much of their time performing menial tasks.
A joint study by the Department of Health and British Medical Association found doctors spend much of their time chasing test results, filling in prescription forms and answering trivial questions.
The survey followed every doctor on a night shift in three hospitals, covering a total of 2,035 hours of work. Almost 20 hours were spent looking for missing X-rays, 26 hours for lab results and 23 hours searching for medical notes.
Despite the fact that nurses could fill in prescription forms, doctors spent 120 hours on this task, and 57 hours being 'bleeped' to incidents that did not require their intervention. In one case, a doctor was bleeped 120 times in a single 12-hour shift.
Alastair Henderson, policy manager at the NHS Confederation, said: 'It is clear that many of the tasks that doctors are currently doing at night are not appropriate and do not need to be done either by doctors, or at night, but certainly not by doctors at night.
'We need a fundamental look at the way that services are provided at night and this means challenging some long-held views about the work of doctors.'
Dr Simon Eccles, who co-wrote the report, said up to a third of doctors' time was wasted. He called for the introduction of physician's assistants, in line with practice in the US, to complete these routine tasks and free doctors to spend more time with patients.
PFaug2003
