Do health professionals have long working hours in your country?

6 comments

1. The argument for it is that you are handing over care less often and thats often when things get missed (because you forgot to pass something on)

   The argument against it is that you are exhausted and that leads to mistakes

   But the main reason – thats how it’s always been done

   I’m a midwife – on Sunday I worked 8am till 6pm, then was called from midnight and got home at 10am – according to my garmin I had 47 minutes sleep. By 8am I was hysterical and not making sense because I was past tired (luckily the last baby was born at 6.29 and both mother and baby were fine and stable by 7am – my adrenaline was lowered and tiredness hit)

2. Yes. I’m a general neurologist in The Netherlands and I’m evening and night call following and followed by a day of out patient clinic. Our weekends are 72 hours of call.

   During my residency we regularly made 12 hour days and had night floats of 7 consecutive night shifts (so sleeping during the day).

   The reasons are a) not enough doctors b) not enough money c) avoiding too many handovers d) tradition.

   I’m not that bothered by it; I’m used to it and we usually get enough sleep during the nights.

   Interestingly, medical specialists are explicitly excluded from the Dutch working hours law.

3. Yes its quite common

   Most typically for doctors and EMS and some Nurses

   In both areas 12 and 24 hours shifts are quite common sometimes even 32 hour shifts for Doctors/Nurses

   For Nurses the thing is that such Hours (normally) only happen in areas like anesthesia and surgery were you have standby time if nothing happens and for normal Nursing jobs like floor or ICU you typically have 8-10 hour shifts

   In general these types of shift should always have some certain Standby Time (so time were you can sleep or do other stuff) but this obviously is not always the case

4. My girlfriend is a doctor and she does have long days sometimes, but never 24h days. Her normal shifts are 8h, but sometimes she has 12h shifts.

5. No there is laws stopping working too much. But there are some working hours that can be free like 2-4 hours in the middle of the day destroying the whole day. Anyone working in healthcare did not have to follow the rest and break rules but that was changed a few years ago but have heard it is still not fully followed yet.

   But I don’t work in healthcare but I know the laws they have to follow.

   But i’m sure long hours happens but then there is more free days

6. I work in an emergency department and for us young doctors day shifts are 10 hours and evening/night shifts are around 17 hours. We’re supposed to have 3 hours of rest on the night shifts but on busy days you’re lucky to get 15 min to eat. The more senior doctors don’t work nights in my department but 8-12 hour day shifts.

   As for why it happens I guess it’s lack of funding and just because that’s how it’s always been. I’d love if we did 8 hour shifts like the nurses but then we’d have to hire more doctors and the hospital can’t afford that.