Her journey included return flights from Colonsay to Oban on the mainland, a 110-mile trip (177km) trip by car to catch a ferry to Islay and a further 70 miles (112km) by road and car ferry between Islay and Jura. Dr Brooks was asked at short notice to fill a gap of three hours and 30 minutes between locum Dr Peter Grant leaving, and the arrival of a regular locum. Grantown-on-Spey-based Dr Grant said: "It is my understanding that it was going to be a local arrangement, but I think the arrangement broke down on the Friday before my departure.
Graphic from here.
"Jan Brooks from Colonsay stayed with us on Jura on the Sunday night, she had to leave Colonsay on the Saturday to get here. She took the flight from Colonsay to Oban and hired a car there." Dr Grant, Provost of the North of Scotland Faculty of the College of General Practitioners, added: "I can't pull a solution out of a hat but I think this situation highlights that large amounts of money is being paid for cover that is not very cost effective or helpful. I think it illustrates that it is not sustainable, it is something that has got to be sorted somehow." Argyll SNP MSP Michael Russell described the situation as "totally daft".
He added: "NHS Highland need to get their act together to ensure there are doctors for all the rural practices - and robbing Peter to pay Paul is not the way to do it." NHS Highland said it had been made aware of the gap in advance and had asked another GP to cover. A spokesman said: "However, this GP was at very short notice unable to provide that cover due to circumstances beyond their control and we had to find a replacement and this we did. Our priority was our patients on Jura and our staff pulled out all the stops to find a GP at short notice and we would like to thank the GP in question for their help."
5 comments:
Another triumph for socialized medicine.
No one on the island had a private plane they could have used?
@Barbwire, this is rural Scotland you know.
@Gareth, actually, there is at least one private plane on Islay, not sure about Colonsay.
They certainly could have hired a RIB though, which could have done the journey Craighouse to Scalasaig in about 30-45 minutes. Don't know what hiring a RIB costs, but quite possibly that would have been also much cheaper keeping in mind all the other travel costs.
They *could* have hired a RIB if the owner had the insurance. Just the same as getting a lift in a private plane, most private pilots don't have the insurance to carry paying passengers. The last time I was on Colonsay there was a single Cessna at the airfield, but I don't know if it was locally owned or visiting.
And you're assuming of course that the sea conditions were something the good doctor would have been willing to brave in a RIB. The Doctor was good enough to endure the trip to offer cover, are you suggesting they should also have made themselves totally uncomfortable?
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