BAMP at odds with QEH over change in consultants’ terms and conditions

The Barbados Association of Medical Practitioners (BAMP) is chastising the Queen Elizabeth Hospital (QEH) for a “unilateral” change in the terms and conditions of work for consultants.

Stressing that BAMP is a trade union representing the majority of doctors at the hospital, president Lynda Williams expressed “great surprise at the announcement in the press, made by the Chief Operating Officer (COO), Mrs Christine Greenidge, that there will be a change in the terms and conditions of work of the Queen Elizabeth Hospital consultants”.

“This announcement was made unilaterally, without any prior consultation with us as a trade union and was made in the same week that BAMP, after many delays, secured a meeting with the executive directors of the QEH,” Williams said in a statement issued late Tuesday evening.

“One of the purposes of this meeting was to discuss the terms and conditions of work of the junior doctors as well as the contracts of the consultants and other grades of doctors.”

Dr Williams said these discussions are being held to ensure healthy, safe, working conditions for doctors who are often under great psychological stress when they are unable to provide medical care for the public in a safe, efficient and timely manner.

The spokesman for the medical fraternity said: “Simply stating that the ‘current model of consultancy doesn’t work for Accident and Emergency consultants’ is a gross oversimplification of an extremely complex problem; one that involves issues relating to bed management, shortages of supplies, lack of nursing staff and other staff, unavailability of lab tests and lack of access to X-ray reports as well as many other administrative issues. We want the public of Barbados to know that all departments of the QEH have 24-hour coverage by consultants who already gratuitously work many more hours than their contracted 21 hours a week.

“We are extremely disappointed by the position taken by the senior management of the hospital, through the office of the COO. This is not how good labour relations are fostered and we register our discontent about the process followed to date,” Williams highlighted.

(EJ/PR)