Work-to-Rule in Practice

I'm temping in Cork University Hospital at the moment. It is a place riddled with politics, disgruntled employees and a rigid refusal to step outisde the bounds of your Union issued job description. It is the type of place where a work to rule makes a real impact before you ever begin to contemplate the fate of the now extremely congested Accident and Emergency. A meeting to discuss the impact on my role as Ward Clerk expected the work to rule to last no longer that 6 hours before A&E would come to a standstill. Communication is coming to a halt throughout the hospital, beds are not being freed up, appointments are not being made, jobs are being done by people untrained to do so. No phones are being answered, patients charts are missing and the atmosphere on many wards is decidedly frosty.

A&E is the type of place where there are so many other important things going on around you that even on a normal day I feel like a hedgehog ready to retreat into a ball if any of my questions or queries rumble or distract from saving lives. Today I feel like I am walking on wafer thin ice over a lake of strern faced nurses, consultants frustrated at having eveything so unprepared for their brief rounds and generally a sense of worry and unease as to what is to come. I will post again if anything of note happens.