The latest Quarterly Monitoring Report from the King’s Fund surveying NHS trust finance directors reveals deepening pessimism about local finances and concern about the outturn for the current financial year. New NHS inflation figures from NHS Improvement reveal the true extent of the financial pressures facing the NHS this year and up to 2020/21. How much money […]
Category: NHS
Reena Aggarwal on the politicisation of junior doctors
The term junior doctor has entered into vernacular. We have become a news story with media, politicians, and satirists all using it as subject matter. Last year little was known about junior doctors and it would have seemed very unlikely that the medical fraternity would have routinely filled headline news as they do now. I […]
Tara Lamont and Tom Quinn: Driving better care—research and ambulance services
What do you get with twenty pigs and ten humans? Not a giant hog roast or a bad joke about xenotransplantation. No, this appeared to be the full extent of testing of one type of emergency equipment before it was widely used in ambulances. The “can do” attitude in emergency services means that new technologies […]
The chief executive’s tale: Exit interviews
People always surprise you. When I started interviewing retiring NHS chief executives to support a project with the King’s Fund, I had several preconceptions that were quickly disproved. The first preconception was that my four interviewees would be tempted by the traditional exit interview traps of score settling or self-authored hagiography. Instead what I found was […]
Janis Burns on the junior doctors’ dispute: How can we achieve an outcome that satisfies the majority?
As with most things in life, the best solutions are often the most simple, and with retrospect, they were glaringly obvious. The resumption of talks between the BMA and the government was facilitated by our royal colleges suggesting nothing more complicated than a five day pause. A ceasefire called for by the natural mediators. What […]
Rachel Clarke: Junior doctors’ dispute—Jeremy Hunt musn’t ignore doctors’ genuine concerns
It’s ironic, isn’t it? Even as last ditch truce talks to settle the junior doctors’ dispute got underway this week, UK health secretary Jeremy Hunt has come under fire yet again for going to war with doctors on the flimsiest of pretexts. Yesterday, a stroke physician from Oxford University, Professor Peter Rothwell, talked about research that […]
Ellen Broad and Tom Sasse: Google deep in trust issues around use of UK patient data
We all need different kinds of medical care at different points in our lives. When we interact with our GPs and healthcare providers, we hope that our doctors and nurses know everything they need to know to help us get better. We want to get the best possible care and we want the experience to […]
Neena Modi: How might the junior doctors’ dispute be resolved?
After months of stalemate, a brief pause has been suggested so that both sides in the junior doctors’ dispute can take a deep breath, and get back to talking. How might this pan out? Let’s start by being quite clear: Paediatricians have always delivered a 24/7 service and the government’s own equality assessment shows that […]
David Oliver: A dispute played out via soundbites and spin cannot end well for services
I write this a few hours after the BMA agreed that it would take up the offer of renewed contract talks with the government, brokered by the Academy of Medical Royal Colleges. The government have in turn agreed a temporary suspension of imposition. PR has coloured the whole saga of the contract stand-off. What had […]
Junior doctors’ dispute: pause is welcome but fundamental problems remain
A five day pause in work to introduce a new contract for junior doctors could be a welcome opportunity for both sides to engage meaningfully on the outstanding issues of disagreement. But it would do little to quell the anger that led junior doctors to the first all out strike in the history of the […]