Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by 2b3a51 1112 days ago
UK: there was a proposal to introduce weekend surgery to make better use of operating theatres. The problem is staffing the facilities. Lead times on training people are long. And in UK the training process is not cheap and has significant up-front costs for the people being trained. Nurses as well as surgeons.

We used to have bursaries to cover the cost of training for nurses, but, austerity and all.
2 comments
Retric 1112 days ago
That seems backwards, unless you also need to be preforming more surgeries and thus need more people. Instead reduce the number of operating theaters while keeping a similar number of people. Net result same amount of operations, but lower capital expenditure.

Of course you now need to pay people more to be working in the weekends, but that’s a different question.

link
2b3a51 1111 days ago
Yes, the UK needs more surgery capacity.
link
Retric 1111 days ago
In that case it needs more workers independent of doing weekend surgery.
link
whimsicalism 1111 days ago
If you are unable to supply enough surgeons for the surgeries people actually need, something has gone terribly wrong with your price signaling mechanism.

Perhaps this is a problem with the UK system.

link
lostlogin 1111 days ago
> Perhaps this is a problem with the UK system.

It’s a problem everywhere isn’t it? There aren’t enough surgeons and the price is too high.

link