Hospitals allow for cut in ops

Tuesday 24th April 2007, 11:57AM BST.

Shropshire’s two main hospitals are drawing up contingency plans to cut the number of routine operations, it was revealed today.

The news came as the British Medical Association warned the health service could lose thousands of doctors overseas due to the chaos in medical training.

More than half of doctors surveyed by the BMA are likely to leave Britain if they do not secure a job through the Government’s training programme, it said.

Modernising Medical Careers and the Medical Training Application Service online process have come in for heavy criticism.

And at this stage the Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital Trust doesn’t know how many new doctors it will be allocated.

The BMA has asked for an “urgent meeting” with Health Secretary Patricia Hewitt.

Tom Taylor, chief executive of the Shrewsbury and Telford Trust, said: “We are working hard to resolve this unsatisfactory situation but we are drawing up contingency plans to reduce the number of elective operations in the early part of August.”

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