Revealed: High cost of surgical assistants as experts say ‘cut prices’ workers are draining the NHS as they are paid too much
- The NHS plans to employ a further 2,000 nurse anesthetists by 2037 to make up for the shortage
Hiring low-cost physicians, called nurse anesthetists (AAs), to work in operating rooms is not cost-effective because they are paid too much, research shows.
The experts behind the study, published in the British Journal of Anesthesia, claim they should either receive less money or have their role scrapped entirely.
AAs, whose responsibilities are similar to those of controversial physician associations (PAs), receive only two years of training before being unleashed on patients. They may assess and evaluate patients for anesthesia before surgery, take their medical history, and make clinical assessments. They also monitor patients’ clinical measurements while they are unconscious.
The NHS plans to employ a further 2,000 AAs by 2037 to help close the shortage of around 1,400 anesthetists, who are fully qualified doctors. But there are fears that the original cost-saving target of using AAs has been pushed aside due to a staffing crisis and record NHS waiting lists.
And top doctors have repeatedly raised safety concerns about the role AAs and PAs play in the NHS.
A Mail on Sunday investigation last year found that many PAs were taking on tasks far beyond what they were qualified for – such as making diagnoses and circumventing strict rules to prescribe drugs to patients.
Hiring low-cost medics, called nurse anesthetists (AAs), to work in operating rooms is not cost-effective because they are paid too much, research shows (Stock Photo)
The NHS plans to employ a further 2,000 AAs by 2037 to help close the shortage of around 1,400 anesthetists, who are fully qualified doctors.
There are around 180 AAs in Britain and they receive almost £50,000 a year – even as students. The salaries of more experienced AAs “significantly exceed this,” the report said.
A group of anesthesia experts from British and American universities have looked at the financial impact of expanding AA numbers. It concluded that to be economically viable, wages had to be limited to £40,000 per year.
“The impetus that led to the creation of AAs in the first place was to limit or reduce costs,” the researcher writes. “This original cost-saving objective may have subsequently been supplanted by the now greater and more urgent need to get the work done regardless of the cost.”
In addition to reducing AAs’ wages, the experts also suggest reducing leave and introducing longer hours, meaning they would have more value. However, they also admit: ‘This can be at the expense of fatigue, with all the consequences for safety.’
The researchers add: ‘A final option is to recognize all these realities and limitations and conclude that the UK AA programme, as it has developed, is in fact economically unviable, and end it.’