Most doctors despair of applications process
From Mmc
[ http://www.theherald.co.uk/features/letters/display.var.1256557.0.0.php Original Article]
I WAS intrigued by Dr Harry Burns's comments claiming that Modernising Medical Careers and the applications process, MTAS, are running smoothly.
This would seem directly to contradict the Department of Health, which has such concerns about the efficacy of the process that it has ordered a review of it and is promising to reassess the applications of those candidates who have not been short listed. Perhaps they do not share Dr Burns's confidence that all is well.
Most doctors that I know despair of MTAS. The questions asked were not discriminating, and could be answered effectively by anyone with a flair for creative writing. Experience, postgraduate qualifications and clinical skills were considered less important than the woolly answers to woolly questions.
Some applications have been lost entirely into the ether. Some interview committees have not received the guidance promised for the new-style interviews. A consultant acquaintance of mine was asked to spend no more than 10 seconds on each of the 300 applications he was to short list from.
The whole process has been rushed through and has suffered for it. I have not been short listed, and I am well aware that I am competing against strong candidates. I know that I am not entitled to an interview and that medicine is a competitive field. However, nationally there is a shortfall of more than 8000 posts and I would assert that this is why many candidates have not been short listed rather than because they have filled in the application incorrectly.
Lastly, despite Dr Burns's assertion that the experience of MMC in Scotland is better than elsewhere in the UK, Scottish doctors have been among the most vocal opponents of MMC for the past nine months.
He knows this, and knows that MMC has been implemented against the will of the majority of the profession. We predicted the chaos of MTAS and were not listened to when it counted.
Doctors will be marching in London and Glasgow this Saturday to demonstrate their opposition to MMC and MTAS. This is not a sign that these reforms are welcomed by the profession.
Catie Sykes, 39 Airlie Street, Glasgow.
