This is Going to Hurt: Secret Diaries of a Junior Doctor

I told them the truth: the hours are terrible, the pay is terrible, the conditions are terrible; you’re underappreciated, unsupported, disrespected and frequently physically endangered. But there’s no better job in the world.

‘No. All it means,’ says Ron sympathetically, ‘is that you spent £1,300 on a pencil.’

he just wants to know there’s someone out there who cares. And actually, that’s a very large part of what being a doctor is.

It’s the final shift of the job – a night shift, naturally. My new post starts an hour before this one ends, about ten miles away – but I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it, two hours late and bleary-eyed. Technically this job ended at midnight, a fact that occurs to me on the stairwell at 12.10 a.m. when my swipe card refuses to let me back on

I try to absorb his method. It’s about telling her just the right amount – keeping her informed but not overwhelmed – and delivering everything at the right level; not too much jargon, but never patronizing. Above all, it’s about being professional and kind.

Our hospital has a system to help women discolse abuse – in the ladies’ toilet there is a sign that says ‘If you want to discuss any concerns about violence at home, put a red sticker on the front of your notes’, and there are sheets of red-dot stickers in every cubicle.

In gynae clinic, I go online to look up some management guidelines for a patient. The trust’s IT department has blocked the Royal College of Obstetrics and Gynaecology website and classified it as ‘pornography’.

I think about the enormous volume of paperwork I’ll generate for myself if I document this in the notes, so pretend I never asked the question and send her home.