A conference review by Lynne Greenwood
The final countdown to the introduction of the Working Time Directive (WTD) became a reality as the third annual WTD exhibition took place on 2nd July.
The 250 delegates who attended the event at the ExCeL exhibition and conference centre on London’s Docklands were greeted by a giant clock ticking down the days, hours, minutes and seconds to 1st August 2009, a timely reminder of the approaching deadline for the implementation of the 48 hour working week for junior doctors.
Throughout the day, chaired by Wendy Reid, national clinical lead for Hospital at Night and WTD lead for the Conference of Postgraduate Medical Deans (COPMeD), keynote speakers and panelists emphasised that the paramount considerations of patient safety and junior doctors’ training could be secured within the terms of the directive.
Miss Reid said: "Patient safety is the key issue at a time when there are lots of converging agendas within the NHS, including the Darzi review, 18 weeks access and other service delivery ‘must dos’, plus the availability of medical staff and locums. WTD is a key component to the delivery of those complex change agendas."
She said that team work solutions were already saving lives and that 77% of NHS trusts who responded to a recent survey reported implementing Hospital at Night, which is being extended to out of hours and 24/7. “The UK is seen as a world leader in working at night in teams,” she said.
On training, Miss Reid felt the focus must be on using the whole workforce in ways which support training, safety and service delivery, she said: “Last year we put more doctors into training posts in the UK, but training has changed and we have to be different now. WTD means we must use every clinical episode as a training episode and we must consider supporting training in new ways including the use of modern technology for e-learning as well as multiprofessional team working.”
In the plenary session, Professor William Burr, associate director of medical education at the Department of Health (DH), outlined the latest developments in Modernising Medical Careers (MMC). He said Professor John Tooke’s recommendation (in his report that followed the inquiry into MMC, saying that Medical Education England (MEE) should be established) had been accepted but that it would act as an advisory and not a funding body. He said there would also be regional MEEs for each strategic health authority.
The third annual WTD exhibition changed format this year, with greater emphasis on 15 interactive exhibition areas (IEAs). Each one offered half hourly seminars by key organisations including WTD pilot site trusts, five of the Royal Colleges and Workforce Programmes - NHS East of England.
Sue Dean, director of Skills for Health - Workforce Projects Team*, said: “The aim was to maximise the sharing of learning, solutions and best practice from the experiences of the WTD 2009 pilot sites, to provide the opportunity to interact with organisations who have met the challenges and to investigate the solutions available.”
The exhibition ended with a question and answer session to a four person panel including Dr John Coakley, medical director at Homerton University Hospital NHS Foundation Trust and Dr Simon Eccles, consultant in emergency medicine at the same hospital, national clinical director of Connecting for Health and medical adviser to the Workforce Projects Team*. They were joined by Dr Diana Hamilton-Fairley, deputy medical director and WTD programme director at Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust and Dr David Sowden, senior responsible officer for MMC, dean director of the East Midlands Healthcare Workforce Deanery and chair of the WTD programme delivery board.
Throughout the event the clock continued its countdown and as the doors closed the clock displayed 394 days and eight hours.
Presentations on our interactive event suite are available here:
Working Time Directive 2009 
