Prime Minister Keir Starmer has announced plans to increase the operation and capacity of Community Diagnostic Centres, sparking a response from Dean Rogers, executive director of industrial strategy for the Society of Radiographers:
“The Society of Radiographers welcomes the government’s plan to increase the capacity of community diagnostic centres (CDCs) – but to turn this plan into a reality, we will need clear detail about how these centres are going to be staffed.
“We are heartened to hear the health minister suggest that flexible working is key to retaining NHS staff. The SoR has long campaigned for this – radiography has a largely female workforce, and a lack of flexible working means that radiographers end up leaving NHS jobs for private-sector or agency work. We therefore look forward to seeing more detail about this proposal.
“We also look forward to hearing in more detail how the government intends to staff CDCs, especially if it plans to operate them 12 hours a day, seven days a week. At the moment, it is unclear how these extended opening hours can be safely achieved – but we stand ready to work with the government to identify the solutions needed to make this happen.
“In particular, we want to see how the new extended hours can be achieved safely, without causing increased burnout in an already exhausted workforce.
“There is a chronic shortage of radiographers – the average vacancy rate for radiography is 15 per cent, which means that some departments’ vacancy rates are much higher. A recent survey of our members revealed that 83 per cent could only fill their departmental roster with regular overtime shifts, because of staff shortages.
“Many of our members tell us that too few radiographers are available for each machine – meaning that MRI and CT scanners stand idle for parts of the week.
“In 2020, the Richards Report into diagnostic services for NHS England stated that staffing CDCs would require an additional 4,000 radiographers. However, while the new CDCs came with a budget for equipment, there was no additional budget for staffing.
“CDCs have therefore had to draw on the existing radiography workforce to fill posts – leaving hospital acute departments chronically understaffed as a result. Extending CDCs’ opening hours will only take staff out of hospital acute settings for longer – and robbing Peter to pay Paul will not help bring waiting lists down.
“We have always supported the CDC programme in principle, and we are pleased that this government is choosing to pursue it, rather than trying to reinvent the wheel. However, confidence in the CDC programme has been hit by the previous government’s election spin. Too many CDCs are not in a community setting. Significant capital investment is still required for CDCs to achieve their potential.
“SoR would like to see CDCs credibly funded and implemented in genuine partnership with us and with other unions. We are able to highlight where investment in training for radiographers can save huge amounts of time and money. And we can challenge the government where necessary about the safety of their plans, and where proposals risk increasing the level of staff burnout.
“We appreciate that the government is developing a 10-year plan for the NHS – but we can’t wait a decade to see any change here. Without a clear plan to increase the number of radiographers in the NHS, waiting lists will only continue to grow.
“Our members deserve better. Our patients deserve better.”
(Image: Keir Starmer announces plans to cut NHS waiting times, by Leon Neal/Getty Images)