NHS=Negligent Health Service

Caporegime
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I guess having a wife who until recently retiring was a director of a medical company supplying to the NHS has given me a shocking insight to the unapologetic profligate waste and mismanagement endemic within the monster.

I also think a lot of people wrongly assume the modern GP has the same dedication and work ethic of his earlier counterparts, who performed house calls and earned a decent but not immodest wage. I am afraid a lot of the younger GP's are primarily financially driven, to a much greater extent than their forebears.

Plus of course lambasting the NHS is almost taboo, despite them often richly deserving such condemnation.
a lot of this is just make believe though (GPs being primarily financially driven is simply not true for the vast majority) or just ignorance (house calls for instance are massively inefficient but still happen).
 
Associate
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I guess having a wife who until recently retiring was a director of a medical company supplying to the NHS has given me a shocking insight to the unapologetic profligate waste and mismanagement endemic within the monster.

I also think a lot of people wrongly assume the modern GP has the same dedication and work ethic of his earlier counterparts, who performed house calls and earned a decent but not immodest wage. I am afraid a lot of the younger GP's are primarily financially driven, to a much greater extent than their forebears.

Plus of course lambasting the NHS is almost taboo, despite them often richly deserving such condemnation.

Aaah yes, that old chestnut of "Young people just don't try hard enough / work hard enough / are lazy".
While it is true that the NHS is hugely wasteful "at the top" when it comes to contracts and mis-management, attempting to lay the blame at the feet of the younger generation is no different to people claiming that "young people have it easy" while totally ignoring the enormous increase in cost of housing and living since you were that age.

Of course it has nothing to do with the huge increase in workload and admin paperwork from an increasing population without an increase of GP's / NHS Services that are inline with that population increase. :rolleyes:


a lot of this is just make believe though (GPs being primarily financially driven is simply not true) or just ignorance (house calls for instance are massively inefficient but still happen).

Absolutely. The very idea that someone would become a GP for financial reasons is laughable, especially when as so many are "gleefully" pointing out in the "Mick Lynch" thread that "Train drivers have it easy, all they have to do is go forwards and backwards" ... Surely if either case were remotely true people would be becoming Rail Drivers for the financial gain, not a GP.
 
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I presume from your attitude your wife did this charitably and at the whim of a misunderstood public?

My wife in fact makes me look like a progressive lefty liberal. She's a business woman through and through. Hard as nails, takes no prisoners. Shrewd to the point of meanness. Sorry is not a word i have ever heard her utter. Politically at least as far to the right as myself. Wonderful woman ;)
 
Soldato
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Land of Gin (I wish)
I guess having a wife who until recently retiring was a director of a medical company supplying to the NHS has given me a shocking insight to the unapologetic profligate waste and mismanagement endemic within the monster.

I also think a lot of people wrongly assume the modern GP has the same dedication and work ethic of his earlier counterparts, who performed house calls and earned a decent but not immodest wage. I am afraid a lot of the younger GP's are primarily financially driven, to a much greater extent than their forebears.

Plus of course lambasting the NHS is almost taboo, despite them often richly deserving such condemnation.

There's a young GP at my practice - probably mid 30s and she's very understanding and explains things well.
 
Soldato
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The number of patients waiting for non-urgent NHS hospital treatment in Wales has been growing since the pandemic began.
Around 20% of the Welsh population is now thought to be waiting for a non-urgent treatment.


moreover saw that east angia parents with a 1:1.5K doctor ratio are in middle ground

56608783-0-image-a-58_1649936380063.jpg

(is that an illegal hot-link ?)
 
Soldato
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NHS moan about the number of no shows for appts. Maybe if they make the system or procedure for patients cancelling appts easier, this number of no shows will reduce.

As my mum tested positive a couple of days ago, she had a mammogram scheduled today. Rang the number on the letter - kept ringing. Rang the booking line, kept cutting off. Rang another number for the breast screening at another hospital (may had another number to ring) - it’s now a different dept.

She finally managed to speak to someone 30 mins later. Scheduled 3 weeks time
 
Man of Honour
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Stoke on Trent
NHS moan about the number of no shows for appts. Maybe if they make the system or procedure for patients cancelling appts easier, this number of no shows will reduce.

As my mum tested positive a couple of days ago, she had a mammogram scheduled today. Rang the number on the letter - kept ringing. Rang the booking line, kept cutting off. Rang another number for the breast screening at another hospital (may had another number to ring) - it’s now a different dept.

She finally managed to speak to someone 30 mins later. Scheduled 3 weeks time

Sometimes we get calls into our Department of concerned patients who want to cancel but can't get through to Appointments.
I get their details and email one of the Team Leaders which I shouldn't be doing.
 
Hitman
Soldato
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My experience this year, two different tales. Went to A&E on a Monday morning with an eyeball injury (two scratches), wasn't particularly quiet. I was triaged within about 10 minutes, called in to a doctor/trainee of some sorts 15 minutes later, then heading home no more than 30 minutes later with treatment in hand. Expected to spend a few hours in there but was in and out within the hour.

Had my BP checked at a routine aviation medical exam who suggested I see my GP as it was sky high. Rang them (Thursday) and explained how high it was, told to call back at 8am to see if there's any appointments. Rang at 8.30am (soonest I could) the next day (Friday), told to call back on Monday at 8am to see if there's any appointments. Given the average wait time for a cardiology appointment is currently almost 14 weeks in our area, I gave up with the GP/referal route, contacted a private cardiologist, booked an appointment with him for 8 days ahead. ECG, echocardiagram, full bloods, 24h ABPM all done within a normal hospital between his normal NHS patients. I genuinely feel sorrow for those having to wait weeks, months and years. It felt like cheating the system, and really wasn't that expensive. I am considering private health care now going forward.
 
Soldato
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I haven't posted my experience yet but here it goes...
Mon 6th - Diarrhoea started early in the day. Vomitting commenced in the evening, just as I was putting my daughter down. Wife had left for Paris - I missed her by 2 minutes asking to cancel the trip as her train left.
Tues 7th - D&V all through the night. Really the worst I've ever had it. I managed a client call (we won the bid!) and then laid up till my wife got back. Thank god. Rang 111 at 8pm, they said get to A&E urgently as you have serious dehydration.

Ended up going to A&E where I waited, standing up, for 6 hours before I had to throw the towel in and literally crawl into a taxi home.

Weds 8th - Called 111 in the morning, worse than ever - ended up at different A&E. I was seen after 4 hours then admitted for the night on a drip. They were worried about organ failure due to the extent of the dehydration. The facilities and staff were incredible.

It was soul destroying to see people who were elderly on their own, or seriously ill, waiting just like I was at hospital 1. Very tragic.
 
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No means of verifying this *****'s age, enough patently obvious malpractice from him to be worthy of being thrown out years ago. I wonder what 's so special about him that made the NHS reluctant to just boot his indeterminate age wrinkled arse right up the road.... ? Shooting is far too easy, a stake through the heart might be more appropriate.

"But we need these foreign doctors..." Yeah, like a hole in the heart.

We are one of the wealthiest nations on earth yet we give surgeon jobs to people from dumps where they don't even log their birth. I wonder how legitimate his qualifications were, too?

But it's OK, "Lessons will be learned" will be the forthcoming NHS response.

Look at the state of him, I wouldn't give him a gardening job.
 
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Soldato
Joined
29 Jul 2004
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7,051
Managed to get a GP appointment the other day at long last, turned up at 8am, I was the only person in the waiting room.

Rewind 3 years ago and it would have been absolutely packed with people. Quite shocking to see really, I wonder why there are obscene waiting times now!
 
Soldato
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I think many are realising that however much money is thrown at the NHS, next year they'll want more, for less, ad infinitum.
Well yeah, that's the root of the problem. 99% of all NHS problems/issues can be traced back to two things: underfunding, and the long term damage caused by underfunding. Sadly the problem has snowballed a lot over the past 12 years, I.E there are now entire buildings boarded up on some NHS sites because the trusts were not given enough money to maintain all their buildings so over time things needed fixing (radiators burst, ceilings leaked, etc) but they weren't given the money to fix it so then there was even less for maintenance, until it got to the point where the buildings were uninhabitable.

The government simply don't seem to understand that costs go up over time, and if you don't cover those costs then things get left out and that has knock on effects that result in additional cost. I.E most claims made against the NHS can be traced back to underfunding, and the sadly comical thing is in most instances the resulting pay-outs exceed the amount that was "saved" by inadequate funding :(
 
Commissario
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Panting like a fiend
Well yeah, that's the root of the problem. 99% of all NHS problems/issues can be traced back to two things: underfunding, and the long term damage caused by underfunding. Sadly the problem has snowballed a lot over the past 12 years, I.E there are now entire buildings boarded up on some NHS sites because the trusts were not given enough money to maintain all their buildings so over time things needed fixing (radiators burst, ceilings leaked, etc) but they weren't given the money to fix it so then there was even less for maintenance, until it got to the point where the buildings were uninhabitable.

The government simply don't seem to understand that costs go up over time, and if you don't cover those costs then things get left out and that has knock on effects that result in additional cost. I.E most claims made against the NHS can be traced back to underfunding, and the sadly comical thing is in most instances the resulting pay-outs exceed the amount that was "saved" by inadequate funding :(
the other 1% from the manglement the government requires to keep track of all stats that the government likes to massage to make themselves look good.

It's basically like anything, you ignore a small problem or maintenance and it then becomes a big problem:(

It really doesn't help when say a trust or ambulance service is fined because it doesn't meet targets it couldn't afford the staff to meet, so it just gets worse.
I remember seeing years ago that at least one ambulance service kept getting fined for not meeting targets so every year their available budget basically got smaller so less staff, older equipment and training being put off for "rarer" events meaning that eventually no one who hadn't been recently trained in another service was qualfied to do some of the "once a year or less" things, at which point the patients aren't being treated on the way to the hospital meaning they're in worse shape and it costs more/reduces the chance of surival.
 
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