NHS advice ahead of latest Industrial Action

From 7am on Monday, October 2, hospital consultants and junior doctors will begin a three-day strike until 7am on Thursday, October 5, and The Society of Radiographers will join them from 8am on Tuesday, October 3 until 8am on Wednesday, October 4.

NHS Trusts across Cheshire and Merseyside, including The Countess of Chester Hospital, are set to be impacted – with service disruption highly likely.

Hospital consultants are the NHS’s most senior clinicians, whose roles cannot be covered by other staff. Strike action by consultants will still deliver Christmas Day levels of care – meaning emergency departments will still be open and staffed with consultants, but disruption and longer waits should be expected.

Meanwhile, junior doctors make up around half of all doctors in the NHS – they are qualified doctors who have anywhere up to eight years’ experience working as a hospital doctor, depending on their specialty, or up to three years in general practice.

The NHS is urging the public to use NHS 111 Online for all non-emergency healthcare needs.

Urgent and emergency care services will continue to be open for those who need them, and the NHS will also continue to deliver planned care wherever possible, especially for patients in greatest clinical need.