Junior Doctors on the Isle of Wight will be taking part in industrial action today (Wednesday) and tomorrow.
The strike forms part of a schedule of industrial action due to a dispute about weekend pay, career progression, and fears of overworking.
Isle of Wight NHS Trust say that “well-prepared contingency plans have been put in place to ensure minimum disruption during the next planned industrial action by Junior Doctors”.
Junior doctors will be providing only emergency care from 8am today to 8am on Friday 8 April.
Appointments and operations as normal
Patients who have existing appointments or scheduled operations during this period should attend as normal, unless they are contacted by a member of Trust staff to rearrange their treatment.
A Trust spokesman said:
“We have tried and tested plans in place to deal with a range of disruptions, including industrial action. Our highest priority is to ensure the safety of our patients, regardless of industrial action, and robust plans are now in place to enable services to run as smoothly as possible. We will continue to regularly monitor the situation and liaise with our junior doctors.”
They go on to say that “emergency care will not be affected by the industrial action, and we hope that there will be minimal impact across all other aspects of our service”.
Further days of action
The British Medical Association have announced that on 26th and 27th April 2016 there will be a full withdrawal of labour by Junior doctors between the hours of 8am and 5pm on Tuesday 26 and Wednesday 27 April (18 hours in total).
The Trust is putting plans in place for this period and it is more likely that it will be necessary to reschedule operations and clinics during this period than has been the case for the periods when emergency cover was provided by the Junior Doctors. As with previous periods of industrial actions patients will be notified on an individual basis if their scheduled treatment is affected.
Image: garryknight under CC BY 2.0
