AUTHOR EXCLUSIVE
Adam Kay on life after the NHS
What made you write This Is Going To Hurt?
The book is based on diaries I kept during my time as a doctor. Once I left the NHS, they just sat in a filing cabinet. But then, two years ago, junior doctors came under fire from the Government and lost their battle. I realised doctors weren’t getting their side of the story across. All I was hearing was that they were being greedy; it was really heartbreaking. In my experience, junior doctors all work 100-hour weeks and definitely aren’t in it for the money. I thought if I could do something small to amplify doctors’ voices, that would be good. How did you find writing the book? In retrospect, it was my therapy. What they don’t teach you at medical school is how to cope with the bad days. So you find your own way of coping and, for a lot of doctors, it’s drink or drugs. For me, my pressurerelease valve was writing it all down. The book highlights real ups and downs – what was it like to live it? It’s the nature of the job: one minute you have a case you know is going to be your dinner party conversation for ever; the next patient is a baby without a heartbeat, and it’s the most tragic moment of that family’s lives. It’s all-consuming. Friendships suffer because you routinely finish three hours late and you’re always texting to say sorry. The relationship I had during my time as a doctor ended, as a lot of relationships do. Of the seven Christmases I was qualified as a doctor, I only saw my family for one. What made you leave medicine? I had a very bad day at work. When you work on labour wards, all you ever want is a healthy mum and a healthy baby, and this time I had neither. It floored me, and I realised I was made of the wrong stuff. They say obstetricians have a big disaster every five or six years; I realised I couldn’t cope with that ever again. I used to wake up at least once a week in a cold sweat thinking about it but, since writing the book, that’s stopped happening. Do you ever miss the job? I miss it hugely, I really do. The privilege of doing something useful is the most amazing dopamine fist-bump. Even when you’re driving home hours late, your dinner is in the dog and you’re covered in blood, you still smile because of what the job is. Are you surprised by how well the book has done? It’s been crazy. For me, its success isn’t the number of months at number one [more than five], it’s the thousands of messages from doctors saying thanks for speaking up for us and from members of the public saying they didn’t realise what life is like for junior doctors. Matt Hancock, the health secretary, name-checked me as a catalyst for raising the issue of getting more support for doctors, and that made my year amazing. To think that I can actually make a difference, that’s beyond my dreams. What are you working on now? The BBC has commissioned a series based on This Is Going To Hurt and we’re writing the scripts. It’s going to be fictionalised, so I can include home life stuff without upsetting actual people! I’m also working on a second book called Twas The Nightshift Before Christmas, about the life of a junior doctor at the most challenging time of the year.