EWTD damages patients’ safety-Surgeons

By Lyndsay Moss

EUROPEAN laws limiting the hours doctors can work have “failed spectacularly” and damaged patient safety, surgeons have claimed.

The European Working Time Directive (EWTD), which was fully implemented a year ago, means junior doctors across the UK are not supposed to work more than 48 hours a week.

But a new survey has revealed concerns among consultants and their trainees over reductions in the amount of practical training they now receive and the impact on patients of repeated change-overs in medics looking after them.

Royal College of Surgeons (RCS) president John Black said: “To say the European working time regulations have failed spectacularly would be a massive understatement.”

Read more