I suspect the problem is too many managers, no central purchasing etc. I remember watching James Martin's programme some years ago when he was trying to sort out hospital food. Some of the lack of common sense decisions was incredible. It's easy to criticise and it's such a massive thing to try and sort out, but no one seems able or willing to "grasp the nettle".
I thought we didn’t have to worry ‘cos the money from Brexit is going to make the NHS wonderful again ... did I misunderstand? ... or did somebody tell porkies ...?
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
The problem with the NHS is it’s a political football and is to big to managed properly
I have experienced it as a patience and frankly the care was secound to none , in fact the NGS has saved my life twice
I have also experienced it by doing a Management Consultanty for my Management degree ( unpaid ) and found it so inefficient as to be mind blowing
My o/h had kidney stones twice the first time we had private Health Care , so efficient but at an NHS hospital , the secound time with out private health care at the same Hospital , not so efficient althoght it was the same Consultant each time , under the NHS , he was no where to be seen , make you own conclusions
I'm thinking that many people would be prepared to pay an extra percentage of tax if they could decide what it would be spent on. In a spirit of true democracy, people could decide whether they wanted the money on MPs ' wages, the trainline to Birmingham, the queen's progeny or the nhs. Like Waitrose green counters
As long as those who give their green counters to the Queens progeny were happy to wait at the back of the queue when they need medical treatment.
Ive no doubt that going private for medical treatment suits some folk ... it certainly suited a member of my family who didn’t want to wait. ...
unfortunately when the op went wrong and he was bleeding to death it was an NHS ambulance and crew that rushed him to the NHS hospital where his life was saved with NHS blood and NHS staff in an NHS operating theatre and he recovered in an NHS ICU and in an NHS ward bed ...
I hope whoever had their operation postponed that day because my relative hadn’t wanted to wait, didn’t need their operation urgently ...
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
I suppose the argument by your relative would be that them deciding to "go private" frees an NHS bed for someone else. The fact that the op went wrong could have happened in an NHS theatre. It does worry me though, that whatever went wrong, the private hospital were unable to cope with it......
We are in the fortunate position of having health insurance. My wife has had cancer six times and a brain aneurysm: three times the treatment has been private, four times it has been with the NHS. The differences are quite pronounced; given the seriousness of her conditions she has always been treated promptly and with faultless expertise from the surgeons.
Differences, however, are much more apparent in the extent of the nursing care. In the private sector the nurses can give more time and more care. In the NHS hospital for example, despite the constant exhortations of the surgeon, the nurses never tried to clear up an infected surgical wound and we were only able to get on top of it after she was discharged. Private hospitals, inevitably, are calmer and have less bustle. I can’t help but think there is a correlation here with cleanliness.
Another marked difference is the degree of senior medical cover at the weekends. Pity the poor F1 run from pillar to post in NHS hospitals at the weekends. Possibly the greatest advantage is the level and continuity of care at follow up clinics. With the NHS there were always really lengthy queues in usually dingy, crowded waiting rooms. When seen, you were rarely attended to by the same person so the long term monitoring was hit and miss. In the private sector you always see the same consultant, and always seen on time. By the same token, when you first present at a clinic in the private sector you have total faith in the seniority of the person seeing you; in NHS hospitals I sometimes half wonder if the doctor is actually a work experience boy or girl!
Indeed indicative of the service provided privately is shown by the fact that six weeks ago my wife had a routine consultation with the max fax surgeon. Having sprained, or so she thought, her ankle a week earlier, the surgeon wanted to know why she was limping. He looked at the ankle (“Are you a foot and mouth doctor?” my wife asked him) and he immediately sent her for an x ray. 30 minutes later he had lined up a very senior orthopaedic surgeon to look at the injury and he diagnosed a small broken bone and torn ligaments. The next morning it was back to the hospital to have an orthopaedic boot fitted. The whole thing was done in about 16 hours. Had she used NHS resources how long would have it have taken to get a GP appointment, referred on for an x ray, back to the hospital to see the specialist (which would not have been the man who treats injured Leicester City and Leicester Tigers players) and then referred again for physiotherapy? Days, certainly; weeks, possibly, but 16 hours, never.
The problem with the NHS isn't simply a case of under funding. Like so many public sector bodies it is horribly top heavy and inefficient. Stories of one authority paying 20 times more for an item than another makes me want to scream. Properly run central purchasing could slash costs but until that instruction comes from the very top, and is actioned properly things won't improve. When a senior exec of one health authority can be sacked for incompetence and then walk back into a very similar role at another authority, it tells you all you need to know about the 'network' at the top of business.
I crossed paths with the NHS many times and for numerous different reasons in the my parents' last 5 years. With perhaps one exception, I never met anyone who wasn't doing the very best they could for the person they were treating. The problem was always one of falling down the gaps when moving from one person to another - delays, lack of consistency. I believe my father came to real harm as result of poor communication between hospitals when he was transferred, but in both hospitals, they were giving him the best care they could. It's the system that fails, not the people working in it.
Dad worked in the NHS for many years from the 1960s and some of his friends were staff - old style ward sisters, for example, who used to have far more control over the entire treatment of the patients under their care. It's too fractured now and too fearful of malicious litigation, which - perversely - makes mistakes more rather than less likely. I'm glad Dad wasn't really aware of what was going on around him - he was an ardent supporter of the principles it represents. It would have broken his heart to know how badly it let him down at the end, had it not already broken his mind.
Gardening on the edge of Exmoor, in Devon
“It's still magic even if you know how it's done.”
Posts
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
I have experienced it as a patience and frankly the care was secound to none , in fact the NGS has saved my life twice
I have also experienced it by doing a Management Consultanty for my Management degree ( unpaid ) and found it so inefficient as to be mind blowing
My o/h had kidney stones twice the first time we had private Health Care , so efficient but at an NHS hospital , the secound time with out private health care at the same Hospital , not so efficient althoght it was the same Consultant each time , under the NHS , he was no where to be seen , make you own conclusions
In a spirit of true democracy, people could decide whether they wanted the money on MPs ' wages, the trainline to Birmingham, the queen's progeny or the nhs.
Like Waitrose green counters
Ive no doubt that going private for medical treatment suits some folk ... it certainly suited a member of my family who didn’t want to wait. ...
unfortunately when the op went wrong and he was bleeding to death it was an NHS ambulance and crew that rushed him to the NHS hospital where his life was saved with NHS blood and NHS staff in an NHS operating theatre and he recovered in an NHS ICU and in an NHS ward bed ...
I hope whoever had their operation postponed that day because my relative hadn’t wanted to wait, didn’t need their operation urgently ...
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
Differences, however, are much more apparent in the extent of the nursing care. In the private sector the nurses can give more time and more care. In the NHS hospital for example, despite the constant exhortations of the surgeon, the nurses never tried to clear up an infected surgical wound and we were only able to get on top of it after she was discharged. Private hospitals, inevitably, are calmer and have less bustle. I can’t help but think there is a correlation here with cleanliness.
Another marked difference is the degree of senior medical cover at the weekends. Pity the poor F1 run from pillar to post in NHS hospitals at the weekends. Possibly the greatest advantage is the level and continuity of care at follow up clinics. With the NHS there were always really lengthy queues in usually dingy, crowded waiting rooms. When seen, you were rarely attended to by the same person so the long term monitoring was hit and miss. In the private sector you always see the same consultant, and always seen on time. By the same token, when you first present at a clinic in the private sector you have total faith in the seniority of the person seeing you; in NHS hospitals I sometimes half wonder if the doctor is actually a work experience boy or girl!
Indeed indicative of the service provided privately is shown by the fact that six weeks ago my wife had a routine consultation with the max fax surgeon. Having sprained, or so she thought, her ankle a week earlier, the surgeon wanted to know why she was limping. He looked at the ankle (“Are you a foot and mouth doctor?” my wife asked him) and he immediately sent her for an x ray. 30 minutes later he had lined up a very senior orthopaedic surgeon to look at the injury and he diagnosed a small broken bone and torn ligaments. The next morning it was back to the hospital to have an orthopaedic boot fitted. The whole thing was done in about 16 hours. Had she used NHS resources how long would have it have taken to get a GP appointment, referred on for an x ray, back to the hospital to see the specialist (which would not have been the man who treats injured Leicester City and Leicester Tigers players) and then referred again for physiotherapy? Days, certainly; weeks, possibly, but 16 hours, never.
Dad worked in the NHS for many years from the 1960s and some of his friends were staff - old style ward sisters, for example, who used to have far more control over the entire treatment of the patients under their care. It's too fractured now and too fearful of malicious litigation, which - perversely - makes mistakes more rather than less likely. I'm glad Dad wasn't really aware of what was going on around him - he was an ardent supporter of the principles it represents. It would have broken his heart to know how badly it let him down at the end, had it not already broken his mind.
“It's still magic even if you know how it's done.”