RMO International
reviews and complaints

This so-called employer recruits doctors from overseas to work in British private hospitals. You can choose between contracts " 14 days on /14 days off" and one week off/ on. Well, before I decided to resign they said nowadays there are also one week on and 3 weeks off available. The hospitals used to be private but now they have lost their contract with so now they only supply hospitals with Resident Medical Officers. Resident means that you have to stay in the hospital all the time . They will tell you 50 times that a RMO mustn't leave the hospital. You will get an accommodation there. In some hospitals it is a patient's room with a remote control bed- in my case it was a solid room with dirty walls and a shower with mould and hair from the previous RMOs. The kettle had green chalk pieces inside and the room was just next to the access to the restaurant, board room and morgue -so you would be definitely be woken up by the slamming of the fire doors at 7:00an- if you were lucky not to be woken up by that time. The matron said that her door was always open and we should just drop down an e-mail- well she ignored my requests. The agency divides every hospital into categories - mine was belongs the lowest in terms of payment 10£ per hour, although it has 64 bedrooms, outpatients, pre admissions, chemotherapy department and recovery room . Everybody is allowed to ring the RMO and during the night or at the weekend you are the only doctor aboard. So in case of emergencies you will be bleeped as well. They have bleeped me 50 times ( in two cases it was a mild emergency) . The other alarms were either false alarms or testing( there is a lovely German fairy tale about a boy who always cried for help and when he was really in danger nobody came). Mostly Romanian doctors do this job. I met the most wonderful people in my life- but some of them were being told to get back to Romania if they complained about the hospital or the bad working conditions. The agency tries to be friendly but in their handbook you will find advices that you should have a shower every day and how to behave in Great Britain. In the induction day they did some (unhealthy)catering ( crisps, wheat flour sandwiches )and after I gave a feedback ( because I used to get something better when you are a doctor and spendyour whole day voluntary at a clinical conference they will provide you with a variety of healthy food) I was asked why I degraded their catering. But it was not just their catering. We had just passed courses in advanced and paediatric life support from the European resuscitation council and even non- medically gave us instructions how to behave in case of an emergency. The salary is rubbish for a British doctor so you won't find any of them there. The general medicine council has introduced a high level of fluency in the level of English for doctors working in the UK. For RMO international work nowadays only two doctors a Polish and a Bulgarian one. They hold titles like the " clinical manager" and are the guarantors for all the RMOs . Well to put it in an honest way, their level of English is far away from a native speaker. Both of them used to be doctors, but surprisingly both prefer working as head hunters or safety guards for other RMOs. I had two nice phone calls with the Polish guy. First of all he was funny enough to ring my dad in Germany (firstly, I was surprised because the country code is 49and not 44-then the next day the British short term manager did the same thing -and my dad was even not surprised because I had been in England all the time and they knew it as well) . The Polish guy tried to find out the reason why I fell sick, after I felt forced into the defensive and told him the reason he said he needed to know it because it might be a chronic condition. The next time he tried to brain wash me to blame me for everything. Well, I worked there and the days were busy: additionally to the time on call you were still busy with stupid things like signing sick notes or drugs to take home for patients who could not wait to get out of the hospital( you would definitely receive a second phone call if you would not show up in 10min of time) . as a RMO you are occupied with a lot of mundane things-but if the hospital is busy I worked there 14-17 hours- one day even 42hours. The Bulgarian clinical manager said to me that I'm not coping well with the hospital and a workload of 10hours per day ( Additionally to the time on call) is fully acceptable and the time where you could read books in hospitals was over. To me this man was completely useless. He was meant to come because the hospital had been busy for 5 days (11 to 14hours every day) . After I rang this employer one woman said that I should stop ringing and complaining about my workload -and that she didn't care how I feel. Then somebody else told me in a way you would speak with a child that this Bulgarian bloke is on his way and he will speak with the manager at the hospital. Well when this Bulgarian doctor came he just shadowed me and didn't even took my phone while I was having dinner break. I asked him when he is going to speak with the matron/ manager. He said he won't because we(he meant himself and me) are just guests here. Well, when I asked him that I have worked even more than 7 hours (56 hours in 5 days on call) he said I cannot have a replacement because replacements have to be arranged. After he I fell ill and the matron had to call them to send a replacement. My disease was definitely triggered by exhaustion. So you get ten £ per hour and when you are ill they pay you statutory sick payment - 50£ per week. I started to realise that now they will have a better deal because they need not to pay the amount of 10£ per hour but only 0, [protected]£ per hour. Well, I said to them that I have recovered and continued but the next night one nurse called me twice once at midnight and then at 4 am, because a patient was complaining about his waterworks . Firstly I had to come because she wanted to show me the result of the dip stick- but I said it was fine because the man was taken antibiotics. secondly she said the patient would have a urinary retention(320ml in bladder scan)- well I came to the ward and said at 4am if you are worried then ring the consultant. She said no, it would be to early. I said your concerns must be serious enough to call me to disturb my night sleep- the consultant couldn't be reached and showed up on the ward at 11am- and send the patient home. The matron blamed me later because I had been using the word "ridiculous" phone calls- and why I had rang the consultant. She also wanted me to feel guilty that I was still poorly and have caused chaos. In my last day at the hospital I asked for a reference she said she cannot promise me this and needed to think about it. Well, the employer and the matron are both only interest in financial matters. The employer receives 10 000£ for every RMO but in the end there's just 10£ left per hour . They spell your names wrongly, mx up dates, threaten you. There has been one pay rise in 6 years of 60£more. The emergency call is sufficient but you have to watch your words: if somebody asks you if you would need the clinical manager because you are exhausted at 4am and will face a normal working day(12+ hours)say "yes" loudly, because if you don't nothing will happen and if you ask the person will tell you that you didn't ask for it and would have a witness ( his wife) that you didn't . To summarise RMO international: it is modern human slavery, exploitive, mean and should be prohibited!