NHS 'not giving value for money'

NewsBot · Mar 27, 2006

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The BBC are reporting
NHS 'not giving value for money'

NHS patients are still not receiving value for money despite unprecedented investment, a former senior Department of Health official has said.
Bob Dredge, who was programme director for financial reform at the department, said that in terms of productivity, value for money has been reduced.

He told BBC One's Panorama he believed too much money was spent on wages.

Health Secretary Patricia Hewitt said her reforms had not created the problems, but would solve them.

It is estimated the NHS in England could run up a deficit of more than £600 million - putting thousands of jobs at risk.

Critics of the government have pointed out that one third of the deficit is taken up with doctors' wages.

But ministers, who have promised to put £94bn into the NHS over the next two years, blame the problems on a culture of overspending in the NHS over the past 60 years.

Ms Hewitt told the BBC: "These financial problems have been there for years, but our reforms mean that we're creating a new NHS."

She said patients now have more choice, GPs have more freedom to get the best for their patients and each hospital has to take responsibility for delivering the best care.

She claimed the extra investment had been spent efficiently, but admitted: "There is considerable room for making much better use of the resources we have got in the NHS."

But the Conservatives' Andrew Lansley says the government has failed in its promise to transform the NHS.

The shadow health secretary told ITV1's Jonathan Dimbleby programme: "There is a financial crisis and they don't know hope to cope with it."

Mr Lansley said the health service needs doctors and nurses, but Labour had instead provided more administrators.
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Cameron · Mar 27, 2006

On a similar theme

"Public services in the UK are treating the elderly as "second-class citizens" and are "shunting them out of specialist services simply because of their age."

http://www.24dash.com/content/news/viewNews.php?navID=7&newsID=4189

Cameron

DAVOhorn · Mar 27, 2006

re elderly

Dear All,

That statement is nonsense>

Nationally 25% of uk population over 65.

So if we use age to ensure parity of access then only 25% of NHS Podiatry caseload should be the over 65.

But in my PCT because we prioritise according to CLINICAL RISK AND CLINICAL NEED 80% of our caseload is the over 65.

In my area a retirement area the population is 30% over 65.

If you go back 10-15 years the criteria was for :

Men over 65
Women over 60.

This was sexist and ageist and did not reflect AT ALL clinical need or risk.

Mental Handicap

Physical Handicap

Children under 16 or in full time education.

Pregnant Women

This is sexist.

Until our world is sufficiently funded then a form of rationing will be required.

Trouble is nobody can come up with a really good form of rationing.

I thought Podiatry was a Health Care Profession and not a social service.

regards David

Mark Russell · Mar 28, 2006

Writing in The Times today, Libby Purvis commenting on the Audit Commission Report into the Care of the Elderly.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article//0,,6-2106348,00.html

Neglect is not only inhumane but economically silly, because it accelerates complete dependence, but examples of a neglectful attitude proliferate.

Here is a small but classic one. An old friend in his mid-eighties, hitherto exceptionally active and adventurous, was observed limping when we met him a year ago. I inquired and he said he had severe pain in his heel but his doctor just told him to take painkillers, which he dislikes. Having had a spell of similar pain myself some 40 years younger, I asked whether anyone suggested shoving supports in his favoured casual shoes — the most commonplace cause of heel pain being flattened or “pronated” arches.

His doctor had neither suggested this, nor referred him to a physio. You can imagine the thought process: “He’s old, so he limps and aches, surprise surprise. Give the old beggar a paracetamol, get him out of here.” I gave our friend a pair of my own off-the-shelf arch supports to try, with rapid results. A year later he walks fine. The impulse to go round and shake his GP was overwhelming.

But not, of course, for him: old people, as the report suggests, mostly don’t like to grumble. Let the self- obsessed young and the sporty-forties complain at every gym twinge: if someone over 70 starts they instantly cast themselves as a grumpy old trout. So “Lucky to be still alive at all, really”, they murmur, and fail to claim their right to reasonably comfortable feet, teeth, spectacles, bed or whatever.
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Somehow, I think this profession has a great deal of work to do.

Mark Russell

Dawn Bacon · Mar 29, 2006

From article by Libby Purves. "His doctor had neither suggested this, nor referred him to a physio".

An illustration that the general public are unaware of the role of podiatrists or even that podiatry exists? I find it so frustrating that Ms Purves' automatic reaction to her friends heel pain was that a physiotherapist should have been consulted.

I will go now and continue banging my head against the brick wall

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NHS 'not giving value for money'

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NHS 'not giving value for money'

NewsBot The Admin that posts the news.

Cameron Well-Known Member

DAVOhorn Well-Known Member

Mark Russell MVP

Dawn Bacon Active Member

Moves to cut falls 'not working' in NHS

NHS 'not in crisis'

Advice needed nhs or private?

Selling additional sets of orthoses to NHS patients

NHS charging/billing codes

Private practice vs NHS

Hyprocure Stent Operation on the NHS

Share This Page

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