Save the NHS!

SexyGreyFox · 17 Mar 2015 at 18:36

Xordium said:
1 Nurse to 5 Patients means that if that nurse is to see the patient every hour then they will get 12 minutes per patient etc

A couple of weeks ago I was watching an A&E Nurse looking after 4 patients (inc my mum) and I couldn't believe how hard she was working. My Mum asked for a pillow but I could see she had no time to find one. A bit later a phone call came in for her and it was at least 10 minutes before she answered it.

heeeed · 17 Mar 2015 at 19:24

joeyjojo said:
NHS spending has never (substantially) decreased

http://www.nuffieldtrust.org.uk/data-and-charts/history-nhs-spending-uk

The news has been giving this impression for a few years in order to make repeated restructuring more palatable.

The difficulty is interpreting all these figures. One of the big issues is that with increasingly aged population and increasing costs of new drugs etc that same funding doesn't allow even status quo to remain. I have no idea what they run their numbers on now, but I know a few years they used to quote that a 2.5% real terms funding increase each year was needed for the NHS to stand still, let alone invest in anything new.

It certainly doesn't feel that there has been any increased funding in reality in the area I work for several years and we are being demanded to do more and more work for the same money (or less) and it is thoroughly unsustainable and the cracks are very clearly showing all over the service.

I don't know what the solutions are because the problems are numerous and also not easy ones to solve. having more trained staff is clearly necessary if people want things to improve, but these cant be magicked out of thin air nor can they be provided at no extra cost.

Xordium · 17 Mar 2015 at 22:20

Dolph said:
Unless you have claims of bias against the NHS team and confirmation of errors in the report, I can

Why would I present something I had not fully investigated and looked at as an excuse for something I don't wholeheartedly believe in.

I am merely pointing out the hypocrisy that when they castigated a private provider you was crying 'foul' now they've done something against something you don't really like they is no 'foul'.

The simple fact until the NHS is adequately funded at the point of care to ensure that the right staff are employed and the right amount of staff are employed for the service they want to deliver it will fail. No amount of trickery or management will change that.

Occam's Razor Dolph it's quite simple. Pay peanuts get monkeys, don't get enough people to do a job and it won't get done, treat good people badly and they will either dumb down to the level that you treated them like or they just up sticks and leave. That is why Stafford etc happened. And I know a thing or two about Stafford because my uncle was fine until he went in there and was dead within a week because they missed some very basic things. But then Southampton were equally shoddy when a family member went through there too.

Dolph · 17 Mar 2015 at 23:37

If all that were true, why did we not see above trend improvements in outcomes when funding was doubled in real terms between 1997 and 2010?

Basic science, your theory is already disproved experimentally.

BuffetSlayer · 18 Mar 2015 at 08:16

Dolph said:
If all that were true, why did we not see above trend improvements in outcomes when funding was doubled in real terms between 1997 and 2010?

Basic science, your theory is already disproved experimentally.

How much of that funding was wasted on inefficiency though, or put into dubiously managed investments? (IE NPFIT)

The entire NHS needs shaking up and looking at objectively. Currently it seems there are too many people with their finger in the pie and they are all pulling in their respective directions because it suits them and the patient gets forgotten about.

Xordium said:
And I know a thing or two about Stafford because my uncle was fine until he went in there and was dead within a week because they missed some very basic things

It came as no surprise to me after my father finally got transferred there in 2004 after a serious accident. We are so thankful he was sent to Derbyshire Royal Infirmary first and spent 8 weeks there before being sent to Stafford because he would not have survived (he barely survived as it is and that was with far superior care at DRI).

The ICU in Stafford was a discrace, and they could have killed him on a couple of occasions if it were not for the regular and insistent presence of our family questioning everything they were doing. IE One day the senior Orthopedic surgeon was getting him prepped to go into theatre to remove metal plates holding his pelvis together. Thankfully my mother was there and realised something was amiss and she had the contact details of the Orthopedic surgeon from DRI. He came down hard on the guy at Stafford. Thankfully we never saw him again after that. The surgeon from DRI was fuming mad and told us outright the removal of those plates would have killed my father. But what if my mother was not there that day?

I dread to think how many families have suffered because they were not around to question what was happening with a loved one.

Trifid · 18 Mar 2015 at 09:57

Dolph said:
If all that were true, why did we not see above trend improvements in outcomes when funding was doubled in real terms between 1997 and 2010?

I think this may be a too simplistic view of the situation. What was the spending profile like in 1997 and then again in 2010? Has the cost of providing healthcare gone up? The cost of drugs? The cost of nurses? Does the NHS have to do more paperwork for compliance? Are basic things more expensive in real terms like bed sheets? Hospitals use more disposable items now too like paper curtains around beds. I suspect mixed sex wards were cheaper to run too. Doctors may have used more instinct previously or cheaper diagnostic tools. If you dig even deeper, I suspect phone bills are more expensive now then they were in 1997.

Xordium · 18 Mar 2015 at 11:45

BuffetSlayer said:
I dread to think how many families have suffered because they were not around to question what was happening with a loved one.

Sounds familiar to me. I went in after he had been 3 days and they hadn't even got him down as recorded as diabetic. And then they wonder why he went down so quick. The local hospital he was sent from couldn't believe he had passed.

dhallam · 18 Mar 2015 at 11:57

It does all come to funding in the end, I should know work in a medium sized college and our funding just been cut again. But The city hospital when my little one was born was Perfect service and that was 12 month ago tho. But the town hospital is near enough closed down due to lack of services.

Cannot see it getting any better in the distance future... thanks Mr Cameron

scorza · 22 Mar 2015 at 19:08

Private healthcare in USA wastes $750bn annually

Interesting article on the 'efficiency' of profit chasing.

Danthus · 22 Mar 2015 at 19:14

You don't need to look at America to see how private money in the NHS has left a terrible legacy, awkward thing for you is, Labour did it.

scorza · 22 Mar 2015 at 19:18

OldCoals said:
You don't need to look at America to see how private money in the NHS has left a terrible legacy, awkward thing for you is, Labour did it.

I'm no fan of Labour, my contention is that the Health and Social Care Act 2012 is far more damaging and threatening to the future of the NHS than anything that happened in 13 years of Labour government.

Danthus · 22 Mar 2015 at 19:32

Tell that to the dead.

marl · 22 Mar 2015 at 19:53

scorza said:
Private healthcare in USA wastes $750bn annually

Interesting article on the 'efficiency' of profit chasing.

Anyone know how much health insurance in the US is for an individual or a family?

I'm assuming if you make a claim then premiums go up?

Tunney · 22 Mar 2015 at 22:05

marl said:
Anyone know how much health insurance in the US is for an individual or a family?

I'm assuming if you make a claim then premiums go up?

This website puts the average cost for a family at $15,000 a year.

Like most insurance, there's likely to be an excess (sometimes the first $10,000 of care) and at risk groups are likely to pay a lot more or even be denied insurance.

Tefal · 23 Mar 2015 at 01:00

marl said:
Anyone know how much health insurance in the US is for an individual or a family?

I'm assuming if you make a claim then premiums go up?

Interesting thing about America is they also pay a larger amount in tax per person for thier health care than we do then insurance on top of that

D.P. · 23 Mar 2015 at 01:26

marl said:
Anyone know how much health insurance in the US is for an individual or a family?

I'm assuming if you make a claim then premiums go up?

Our family health insurance cost around $150 a month, that is the co-pay. We could actually have it cheaper, insurance for my wife and baby are $45 a month and I get entirely free health care from my employer but it was easier to get added to my wife's so my company pays me the difference + tax.
There is a co-pay, something like 25% until it hits $1000 a person or soe thing like $3000 for the family. A lot of these costs you can make back through special health savings accounts like HSA and FSA, so e.g. Today I purchased cold medicine and contact lens solution tax free.

This insurance includes dental and vision, so I get my contact lenses paid for and the eye exam.

Premiums are unaffected by claims, e.g. You break a leg then nothing will happen. Until the Obamacare act then premiums would vary if you prexisting conditions, that has gone away now.

D.P. · 23 Mar 2015 at 01:34

Tunney said:
This website puts the average cost for a family at $15,000 a year.

Like most insurance, there's likely to be an excess (sometimes the first $10,000 of care) and at risk groups are likely to pay a lot more or even be denied insurance.

You weren't good at reading the link you posted.
Average family cover is $4300 for people enrolled in company plans, with the excess being $2075. More telling is the single person coverage, $1225 which is a fair but less NI in the UK.

joeyjojo · 23 Mar 2015 at 09:49

^ Thanks DP. So it's relatively inexpensive if you're young to middle aged and employed. What about when you get older? What if you're unemployed?

joeyjojo · 23 Mar 2015 at 12:21

Two interesting articles:

Bart’s: a flagship hits the rocks of PFI

Neatly illustrates why PFI is a problem. Obviously it makes private investment more attractive and gets hospitals built quickly, but this trust is now faced with increasing repayments year on year while its funding is frozen. Naturally this means it will have to reduce care quality and/or number of patients for at least the rest of this decade. And the real irony:

In desperation the Barts Health board has been splashing out £500,000 per month on management consultants – £7m in the 14 months to December, including £4.85m to PwC, the accountants who gave the nod to the equally disastrous Peterborough Hospital PFI scheme (they were then invited back to mop up the mess there, too).

It's like a gambler going to payday lenders.

***

More shocking IMO:

Leak reveals worrying truth behind the biggest NHS privatisation yet

Interesting insight into the cack-handed contract writing process of these commerical providers.

Wendy Savage of Keep Our NHS Public pointed out in a letter to the Guardian, “Now we have groups of GPs, with no training in epidemiology, oncology or commissioning, making plans to spend millions on an untried system with private companies, who have no experience in cancer care, eagerly waiting to make profits from these sick patients.”

Xordium · 23 Mar 2015 at 19:22

Dolph said:
If all that were true, why did we not see above trend improvements in outcomes when funding was doubled in real terms between 1997 and 2010?

Basic science, your theory is already disproved experimentally.

We did see improvements during that time and we've seen worsening outcomes since.

Basic morality - don't tell lies.