Early details emerge of EWTD review

15 January 2010

EARLY details are emerging of a review into the impact of the European Working Time Directive on doctors’ training.

Professor John Temple is the independent chair leading the review, which begins this month and will make its final report in April 2010. He admitted that so far surgeons have made the strongest representations about the impact of the directive. Concerns have been raised that restricting junior doctors’ hours to an average 48 per week could deprive them of sufficient training time.

Professor Temple, a surgeon, told BMJ Careers: “I would hope they would accept that I’m an honest broker and will come to a proper judgment at the end of the process. One of my biggest problems [with this] is that it has been a gradual thing, yet we come to D-Day and we are still worrying about it.”

Health secretary Alan Johnson first announced the investigation last May. It will look at concerns raised by professionals that the introduction of a 48-hour working week may have had a negative effect on junior doctors’ training. Medical Education England commissioned the inquiry, with the Postgraduate Medical Education and Training Board looking at how training might need to change to reflect the shorter training time available.

The inquiry has also begun a UK and international literature review and has so far met once. It is calling for written evidence from various organisations and individuals including professional, educational, patient and academic groups as well as from across the NHS. Professor Temple will interview chiefs at the Royal College of Surgeons later this month.

The European Working Time Directive was introduced fully in August 2009. Some specialties within some trusts, however, have applied for a temporary derogation from the directive, allowing doctors in those specific areas to work an additional four hours a week for up to two years (until 2011) and, exceptionally, three years (to 2012).