No frills: Basic services. Fast, efficient, and result driven. If you want business class comfort, you pay for a business class hospital. The NHS would provide hospital not hotel service. No optional extras—no lifestyle, cosmetic, or non core surgery. A non negotiable list of essential medications generated centrally. If you want medications not on the […]
Tag: NHS
Martin McShane: Execution
The operating framework for the NHS has now been published. Reading through the detail I was struck by the tasks laid at the door of PCT clusters. These transitional organisations know the date of their death. Despite that, there is an expectation they will continue to deliver, whilst acting as a catalyst for the reforms: […]
Edward Davies: Cheerleading for Lansley at the NHS Alliance
David Cameron’s oft-quoted assertion that the Health and Social Care Bill has now won the support of NHS professionals is much derided. And last week’s volte face from the BMA to actively oppose the bill only further undermines his optimism. In fact it’s hard to find much support anywhere. But support there is and most […]
David Kerr: Complaints via social media
Social media seems to be the modern equivalent of the stocks. The main objective of the stocks was public humiliation. Nowadays, any member of the public can use social media to highlight grievances they might have against companies, organisations, and institutions and post them for all to see and comment on. […]
Ken Taylor: Dr Foster on inpatient hospital mortality
On the Today programme on Radio 4 on Monday morning there was a feature on these recently released data. Two areas were discussed. Hospital mortality is higher out of hours ie nights and weekends. The other item discussed was the smaller number of senior doctors in the hospital out of hours. John Humphrys interviewed a spokesman […]
Edward Davies: Cuts, pensions, and perspective
Walking to the NHS Alliance’s annual conference through Manchester this morning, the streets were peppered with small pickets. University staff, civil servants, transport workers, all sorts of folk objecting to public sector cuts in general and in particular to their potentially diminished pensions. One chap thrust a leaflet at me deploring the effect that cuts […]
Martin McShane: Integrated reflections concluded
Here is my third and final blog on the USA trip: After Seattle’s integrated care organisations, we visited CalPERS. They fund $6.7bn worth of healthcare for 1.3 million people (roughly twice what we have per person in Lincolnshire). They see themselves as “active” purchasers: managing the market to reduce costs. About two thirds of their members […]
Edward Davies: The health service that cried wolf
Too much hysteria is clouding reasonable criticism If you watched Channel 4 news last night, you could only come away with the impression that the government is waging a secret war to privatise the entire NHS. You see, Channel 4 were “exclusively” “leaked” “proof” that “the government is planning to privatise the NHS.” The proof […]
Richard Smith: Can information technology improve healthcare?
I doubt that anybody within airlines, financial services, or manufacturing goes to meetings to debate whether information technology can improve what they do. It already has. But in healthcare we’ve grown very sceptical about information technology. In fact information technology already has improved healthcare and much of what is done now could not be done […]
Chris Ham: Commonwealth Fund survey: If the NHS is doing well, why is it changing?
The Commonwealth Fund’s survey of the experience of adults with complex care needs, published last week, paints a remarkably positive picture of the NHS. The results show that, of the eleven countries surveyed, the number of patients reporting that they did not use services because of concerns about cost was lowest in the United Kingdom. […]