It's Here!

Just a quick post to show you what arrived this morning!

It's official! I'm on the NHS Organ Donor Register.

Organ Donation

Today I did something important; something that I'd been thinking about doing for a long time, but never really had the guts to do: I finally got round to joining the NHS Organ Donor Register.

There's been a huge upsurge recently in the number of people signing up to it; because of publicity and media campaigns, which is fantastic news. But, there are still so many people who don't even want to think about it.

The reason that people avoid joining it, are, I assume, the same as my own reason for delaying joining it for so long: It forces you to face up to your own mortality.

I'm 21. I don't want to have to think about dying. It scares me to think that I could leave the house one morning and never return.

However, one of the main reasons that swayed my opinion is that if I were ill and needed a transplant; I'd expect it. You can't expect a gift from someone if you aren't willing to sacrifice the same if needed, surely?

I don't like it when people get all 'preachy', so I'll spare you that. I'm just saying, we all only have a limited amount of time to live, and, unfortunately, for some of us, that time is more limited than we'd like to think. Accidents happen, acute illnesses occur and sometimes our lives end prematurely. 

Giving someone who's gravely ill the gift of life from beyond the grave is one of the greatest gifts you can give, isn't it?

For as long as I can remember, my Dad's carried an organ donor card. I can even remember him trying to explain it to me when I was an inquisitive young child. Without people willing to give their organs up for donation, there wouldn't be pioneering advances in transplant surgery and there most certainly wouldn't be people here now without them.

If you'd like to join the register, or find out more, go to: http://www.organdonation.nhs.uk/
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Urgh NHS Jobs

I'm sure you will have guessed from the title that I'm talking about the NHS Jobs website.

I seem to have spent endless hours on this website over the past year. (Albeit less frequently recently).

As an aside, I haven't applied for any jobs for about a month now, and it's been wonderful!

If you're not familiar with the website; it's basically where people (existing NHS Employees or the rest of us mere mortals) can apply for jobs within the NHS.

I've lost count of the number of jobs that I've applied to through this website. I'm grateful for its ease, but sometimes it's infuriating.

I have the daily job email from them; where they send me an email every evening with the new jobs in my area that have been advertised. Yesterday, there was an advert for two new Receptionists to work at my local ED. It said that the deadline was the 22nd April and that potential applicants would benefit from an informal visit, so should email or call the relevant people (blah, blah, blah...)

So, I thought: 'Oh, I'll email tomorrow'.

I don't normally go for these informal visits, but this job advert genuinely interested me.

Low and behold, I checked again this evening to get the email address of the contact when I see:

'PLEASE NOTE THAT THIS POST WILL BE CLOSING EARLY AT 12NOON TODAY (FRIDAY 12 APRIL 2013)'

The bumholes.

This isn't the first time NHS Jobs have done this. It's so annoying!! You're forced into applying for jobs that you really want immediately because you're worried that they'll be taken down by the next time you check.

Now I appreciate the employers might well have an unexpectedly large number of candidates applying, but surely doing this is a bit... mean?