If you’ve read down this far, you’ll see the discussion about enterprise agreements above. As a junior doctor, it is important to know what you are entitled to under the contract you signed when you started working.

Medicine has a notoriously poor culture were we are trained to keep our head down, work hard and not seek reward. This is culture is cultivated in medical school where we are taught to be selfless and not seek reward for our services. When you begin working as a junior doctor, this culture translates into the workplace. I’ve spoken to countless junior doctors who ‘feel bad’ for claiming their overtime.

Guys! If you are doing the work, you deserve to be paid for it! This is not a matter of feeling bad or worrying what other people will think of you.

Do you think a tradesperson feels bad when they come to your house, fix your plumbing and ask for a fee??? Do you think the local grocer feels bad for asking you to pay for your weekly fruit and veg??? Do you expect your mechanic to repair your car for free?? Of course not!

So why should you feel bad for claiming overtime when you have had to stay back late to tidy up notes, finish paperwork or assess a deteriorating patient??? These are all essential elements of patient care.

Don’t think of claiming overtime as extra money. Think of it as claiming money that you are OWED for the TIME and EFFORT you have put in to your job.

There are some very bright people who work in hospitals, but none of them are mind-readers. If you don’t claim your overtime, NO ONE (not a soul) is going to know that you actually worked it! It’s really that simple.

Unfortunately, medical school does a poor job of teaching self-advocacy to their doctors-in-training. It is something that you have to learn for yourself and assume responsibility for once you begin working.

This is one that a lot of junior doctors don’t understand. Yes, that’s right. Even as an intern, the overtime you put in can drastically affect the way a department is staffed. Just for one minute, forget that you are a singular entity in a big, scary hospital.

Instead, imagine the hospital from a birds eye view. What do you see? A big building with different departments (cardiology, endocrinology, general surgery etc). Each department gets a certain amount of money from the “powers-at-large” to staff the unit and ensure it runs safely, effectively and efficiently. Each department will only attract more funding and more staffing, if they are able to demonstrate to the “powers-at-large”, that they are in fact deserving of these incentives.

One way this is achieved, is by demonstrating that they are genuinely understaffed. If you are a junior doctor who is constantly working 2-3 hours of overtime everyday and you are not claiming it, your department has know way of knowing that they are understaffed. Consultants and heads of department think that everything is hunky-dory down in resident-land. Claiming your overtime shows the department that they need to do something about making your workload more manageable.

The other thing to remember is that hospitals really care about how each individual unit is staffed. It affects “big things” like hospital accreditation. I’ve worked in hospitals where accreditation has been removed/threatened to be removed because of issues related to junior doctor staffing.