Margaret Haywood was struck off by the Nursing and Midwifery Council last week. She had secretly filmed patients in the hospital where she worked to document the conditions, which she claimed to have previously reported. These images were subsequently broadcast on the BBC programme Panorama. There has been an outcry from nurses, as well as from some families […]
Continue Reading →Check the check up
And lo, the government said, we must woo voters. And they had a great idea: check ups. Let’s not leave them to the private providers. Let’s put them on the NHS. Everybody loves a check up. The Department of Health sets out its new idea in a policy paper “Putting prevention first – vascular checks: […]
Continue Reading →In praise of slow medicine
I have been inspired by Harry Eyres’s piece on Slow London in the FT over the weekend. So much of working in medicine feels like a sprint. Short and overbooked appointments, busy clinics, multiple bits of administrative work to be ticked, crossed, signed and dated; e-mails and correspondence to deal with, questions from patients and […]
Continue Reading →FAST, and furious
The FAST campaign wants you to call 999 if you can answer, about someone you’re with, “yes” to the question “Has their Face fallen on one side?”, “no” to “Can they raise both Arms and keep them there?”, or “yes” to “Is their Speech slurred?” The idea is to get people with strokes to hospital as quickly […]
Continue Reading →The dangers of databases
The Joseph Rowntree Reform Trust is today launching a report, “Database State”, which examines the rationale, security and consequences of 46 public sector databases. It is co-authored by Ross Anderson, professor of security engineering at Cambridge University, who is an outspoken critic of government databases. The results are startling. Two databases, the NHS Detailed Care […]
Continue Reading →Mid Staffordshire NHS Trust: a failure of policy
The investigation into the Mid Staffordshire NHS Trust makes for harrowing reading. The mortality rate at the hospital was found to be high in patients admitted as an emergency. The first data that showed an increase in the standardised mortality ratio was in 2005. The Healthcare Commission investigation was done during last year, 2008, and is reporting […]
Continue Reading →Rate my doctor
The concept of doctor-rating websites seems to be gathering political momentum; in fact, it’s already a reality. The NHS is being offered this data, apparently to ensure that “patient choice” is offered and “patient experience” is good. I think it’s an unproven and potentially hazardous waste of money. There’s a piece that I wrote for the BMJ here; […]
Continue Reading →What the NHS can learn from organ donors
As an unschooled observer of the money markets, I have been struggling in recent months to understand what anything is actually worth. In healthcare, there is a similar problem, though it makes for rather less exciting headlines. All NHS procedures have to be costed to the last penny, and reported on in “completed care episodes”. […]
Continue Reading →Should the NHS underwrite cosmetic surgery done abroad?
The British Association of Plastic Reconstructive and Aesthetic Surgeons have issued the results of a questionnaire asking surgeons if they have had to give emergency treatment to people who have had cosmetic surgery abroad. Unsurprisingly, the answer was yes. This is only the tip of an iceberg – there have been reports of patients returning […]
Continue Reading →The two-tier NHS
Alan Johnson, the Health Secretary, has announced that patients will now be allowed to buy and be treated with medicines not available on the NHS – but without affecting that person’s entitlement to NHS care. Previously, the rule had been that if a patient was having additional treatment in the private sector, they lost their […]
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