There has been a huge spike in the use of locum doctors in the UK in recent years. This, according to some experts in the medical field, is due to the fact that the number of surgeries has increased over the last decade, but the amount of healthcare staff needed to perform these surgeries has not. As a result, healthcare organisations have turned to locum doctors to increase their level of service delivery. Indeed, many hospitals and private practices are actually finding it far easier to employ locum doctors as opposed to retaining existing staff. For Locum Insurance, visit a site like MPRS, suppliers of Locum Insurance services.
As a result, it is quite common for an emergency room doctor to be a locum doctor, especially if the emergency room is short staffed during peak periods. This means that, in order to ensure the highest levels of patient care and the lowest levels of expenditure (for the healthcare organisation) this doctor is required to travel around the country, and will act as the temporary ‘head’ of the emergency room until an appointment can be made with a specialist. However, there are limitations to this system as well. Firstly, there is no opportunity for the doctor to get to know patients and build relationships as you would expect if they were working within their own private care group. Secondly, there is little scope for prolonged interaction with patients.
These are just some of the reasons why healthcare organisations are relying more on locum doctors to fill positions in their hospital or clinical commission. While this has not always been possible, the increasing demand for locum doctors is likely to continue as healthcare organisations realise that they need to find a way of coping with the reduction in staff at a local level particularly to cover staff absence.
