Dr Jack Fletcher, chair of the resident doctor committee at the BMA, said: “We apologise to our patients in the NHS for the disruption to care that will be going ahead.
“As doctors we are apologising all the time for the state of the NHS – for care in corridors, for not being able to offer timely GP visits, and even on non-strike days, sudden cancellations of scheduled appointments that leave people for weeks more than expected on waiting lists.
“These are the result of underinvestment and understaffing, and we are trying to tackle that in our action this week.
“It is even more disappointing that at the last minute in our talks government reduced the funding on the table, leading to these strikes going ahead.
“We are sincerely trying to come to a resolution to this dispute in everyone’s interest, but however close we might have seemed this time, we are still not there yet.”
A spokesperson for Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust, which runs Nottingham City Hospital, said: “Patient safety during industrial action remains our priority. To ensure we continue to provide urgent and emergency care, we have had to rearrange some planned outpatient clinics.
“We apologise for the disruption and we have rescheduled Mr Sims’s appointment.
“We ask all patients to attend planned appointments unless told otherwise, and to please only use A&E in a genuine emergency.”