The health Ombudsman has released a report saying that not enough is being done for elderly people in the NHS. The report has been published widely in the UK press, with many opinion pieces resulting from it. It’s a report in that it consists of ten narratives based on ten complaints. To that end, I’m […]
Continue Reading →111 – where’s the evidence?
Calling 111 instead of your GP? New plans say that we will not be allowed to operate our own appointment systems but to have a call centre do it for us. Call centres work to PROTOCOLS. We in our practice work because the receptionists know people who are a bit vulnerable or chronically unwell – […]
Continue Reading →Cancer Research UK and 1 in 8
Radio 4 news: “1 in 8 women will get breast cancer”. It’s based on a press release from Cancer Research UK. And it is not helpful: these are the figures, below, for risk of breast cancer you want to know (from their press release) . At present, the headline figure media outlets are using isn’t helpful, and […]
Continue Reading →Dr Andrew Lansley’s monster
Fantastic editorial in the BMJ. “What do you call a government that embarks on the biggest upheaval of the NHS in its 63 year history, at breakneck speed, while simultaneously trying to make unprecedented financial savings? The politically correct answer has got to be: mad. The scale of ambition should ring alarm bells. Sir David […]
Continue Reading →Well enough to work
An article about Atos and their work capability assessments, in the BMJ, here. I am finding, often, a distinct lack of co-operation when it comes to polite and basic questions being asked of companies who are contracted to provide services to the Government. I wanted to know about Atos recruitment, audit and training; they didn’t […]
Continue Reading →Surgery for spectators
There’s a lot of press coverage about a piece by Simon Chapman in the BMJ. He describes a charity auction where one prize was to attend a neurosurgical operation. He thinks it was wrong to do so; so do I. Yet this is the logical outcome of so many voyeristic cameras in the consulting room. […]
Continue Reading →Breast health and 1 in 9 again
There are so many things to say that are wrong about the new Breast Health UK service that I’d need all night to write about them. Let me concentrate on just one thing: no, not their offer to perform breast examination on the asymptomatic woman and then teach them how to do it (although it’s […]
Continue Reading →Your options for cancer
Well, I’d recommend an evidence based approach. I feel most upset when I read on the ‘Yes To Life – Your options for cancer website ‘ stories like this ” I’ve always been interested in the field of complementary medicine/therapy, so I started to investigate this in relation to my situation. I found an integrated […]
Continue Reading →No decision about me, without me
..and other fairy tales. From the Conservative party manifesto “putting patients in charge of making decisions about their care” is the choral refrain, and yet this week has seen a new Health and Social Care Bill which, bottom line, seeks to interrupt and decimate relationships between patients, GPs and hospital specialists by putting numerous other messy […]
Continue Reading →Flu vaccination and fiction
There are people with complications of flu in intensive care and much publicity; many people seem very anxious to pay for a flu vaccination privately if they don’t fall into the NHS’ ‘at risk’ categories. The chair of the RCGP has called for healthy people not to be given flu vaccination in order to save supplies […]
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