The Beginning Of The End

It's finally begun. Following the decision of the judicial review 2 weeks ago where RemedyUK lost their battle to have MMC essentially scrapped this year, deaneries have now begun handing out offers of ST programme places to candidates. Every day now, people wait - hoping that today will be the day they receive that letter in the post or that e-mail in the inbox. And every day, that hope is beginning to fall. Almost all the offers that were going to be made now have been done, so until 10th June there is not much to do, as people with multiple offers are holding onto them in the hope that perhaps they might get offered something better in the meantime. After 10th June, deaneries will re-release refused offers to the next person on the list....and the game of musical chairs will go on, until there's no more chairs for people to sit in.

And how are the deaneries choosing candidates? Well, unfortunately, now that the online MTAS system has been scrapped, and power devolved to individual deaneries once more, there is little to ensure that fair practices are followed. If there is an answer, it isn't being given to candidates. Perhaps all offer decisions were already made at Round 1a interviews, with 1b just being an exercise for fun. Perhaps the offers are only being made to local candidates, as they're "known". And perhaps for once in the entire history of this sorry affair the people in charge have got it right, and have ranked all candidates and are choosing like that. We may never know.

Where I'm currently working (William Harvey Hospital, Ashford, Kent), up until today, there has been not a single word of anyone obtaining an ST offer bar a surgical registrar that was offered an ST3 post. However, I have finally heard of someone receiving an ST1 post in Ophthalmology via the Eastern Deanery, which currently makes him the luckiest person in the hospital as he can now relax in the knowledge that his life has been spared any further trauma, emotional, financial, or otherwise.

As for the rest of us, all we can do is stand here in the dark with our candles, hoping that we too will get let inside before the little flame between our hands gutters and dies out....