Guernsey Literary Festival: Adam Kay

Today I had the pleasure of going to watch Adam Kay talk as part of the 7th edition of the Guernsey Literary Festival. It’s the first time I’ve actually attended one of these events, so I wasn’t entirely sure what to expect, but I hoped that the experience would make me feel cultured, and it was a great excuse to take a two hour lunchbreak.

Mr Kay (or Dr Kay, as he was formerly referred to) was speaking about his recent bestseller, “This is Going to Hurt” which recounts his experiences as a junior doctor in the NHS. Given that after he left medicine, he became a very successful comedian - repeatedly selling out a Fringe show and writing for Mitchell and Webb amongst others - it is no surprise that he was a funny guy and the book is marketed as being largely comedic. While I didn’t share the crowds enthusiasm for all of his jokes, some of them did ellicit a genuine chuckle from me, so kudos to Mr Kay, and I am assured the book is definitely hilarious.

The talk, and I suspect the book, have a message that is far from comical, and indeed the things I took away from the venue this lunchtime were the brutal, harrowing personal stories that Kay shared. His expressed aim was to give the public at large an understanding of what doctors go through in their everyday lives, the toll it takes on their interpersonal relationships, the relentlessness of it all, the culture of suffering in silence and the lack of vital support networks.

While there was a very much political component to his final, impassioned plea to the audience (which involved stressing the necessity of the NHS receiving more funding), I walked away with a change view of doctors and our healthcare system as a whole. They are every bit as human and mortal as the rest of us, but are frequently called on to perform superhuman tasks, without any of the recognition or admiration that comicbook heroes get. I feel incredibly privileged that I work in technology, that I will never have to do with anything as traumatising in my professional life as every healthcare professional does, and next time I visit my GP, I will have a far deeper level of respect for her than I previously held.