While I'm not defending the schedules that hospital employees work, one thing to factor in is that every hand off can increase errors. (I wish I could find a paper, but I'm on mobile and not having luck.)
However, yes, I do believe that multiple 12+ hour days in a row is ultimately counterproductive. Also, I wonder if overlapping shifts would reduce the chance of errors.
Those long shifts are there to protect patient safety - they reduce the number of dangerous handovers. Part of being a doctor or in something like the military is putting other people first rather than having a comfortable short day.
Handovers are dangerous, but making decisions that need your full attention after hard working 11:30 hours is also dangerous. And sometime doctors have even longer shifts.
It's an insane culture.
My guess is that it is easy to spot error in handovers (X didn't say/write this, Y didn't hear/read that). But errors due that you have worked 11:30 hours are more difficult to isolate.
Why do you think the hospitals do long shifts then? Just for fun?
They don't do it for people who aren't doing handovers, like general practitioners who can work half-days just a couple of times a week if they want, or administrations. So we know it isn't inherent for doctors or for the staffing of the hospital. Only for those doing handovers...
Personally I don’t find “everyone is doing this so it must be rational” a very convincing argument. After all, maybe everyone else followed that same weak argument.
But conversely how do you think everyone arrived at an unsafe practice particular to just these doctors who do handovers and no others? And why do you think they’re campaigning themselves to bring them back for safety in the UK?
Take this for example - from the Guardian, a very left-wing newspaper that is normally about as far from arguing for longer hours for works as you can possibly get.
> The report suggests the shorter working week is responsible for a lack of continuity in out-of-hours care
> shortening rota hours had led to more shift changes between medical teams and greater chances for mistakes to occur
> the early effects of the 48-hour European working time limit on surgeons and found that these new rotas had almost entirely removed adequate time for handover of sick patients
Also think about this - those doctors who don't do handovers, such as a dermatologist doing out-patient clinics, don't work long hours. Hospitals only do it where clinically required.
Hospitals have some of the most toxic work cultures around. So much of that shit is perpetuated by senior level employees justifying hours that are harmful to patient care with “I went through it so why shouldn’t you?”
And you don't need to put double quotes around employees. They are employees and deserve to work in a good environment like everyone else