To ensure that our sessions are free for the medics who need us, we cover the cost of the sessions so that the medics can receive all the support with none of the financial burden.
We created Protect the Medics in 2018 after being inspired by Dr Adam Kay's book titled This Is Going To Hurt, and his stories of life as a junior doctor in the NHS. He pointed out that NHS staff witness and experience awful things on a daily basis and there is hardly a support system available to them, they are expected to just carry on as if nothing has happened. We realised that this isn't okay, there needs to be a solid place for medics to turn when the things they witness at work become overwhelming, or even when work in general becomes too much.
We think that medics are severely underpaid for the work they do, and we realised that if we were to start a charity, we needed it to be free at the point of delivery, so we decided that whilst we will have counsellors on board to offer the support to the medics, we would also be the ones to pay those counsellors for their services so that the medics don't have to.
We will also use any money donated to expand our future ideas for the charity, including a buddy system that pairs currently qualified medics with first-year medics so that the first years can have someone there to offer them advice and support throughout their first year. We would also like to introduce a Student Hub, a forum where Medical Students can have a confidential and anonymous place to ask questions, voice their concerns and also get any stresses or frustrations off their chest, without the fear of being judged by other students.
The current pandemic has hit our NHS hard, and they need our support more than ever, so we are in need of donations more than ever before too.