State of the NHS

State of the NHS

Truly and utterly I believe that the NHS is the worst managed of any comparably sized organisation.

Look at this today:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/6228659.stm

The workforce planning is a disgrace.

Some years ago, the government massively increased the number of places at medical school, to combat a shortage of doctors. Well and sensible. However, there isn't enough money in the hospitals to pay them, so you have a situation where graduates are taking the quarter of a million pounds of taxpayer-funded training and taking it abroad.

We're paying to train doctors we can't emply because there isn't any money to pay them after they qualify, despite a need for them.

We have a long history of benefitting from foreign doctors in this country, and yet with little/no warning last year, it was decreed that doctors from outside the EU must be able to prove that there is noone from europe who could do their job - this applies to, say, and Indian doctor, but not a Polish doctor (yet "isn't" discrimination).

I haven't even got on to nurses.

The NHS is perhaps the only medical organisation in the world overly managed by lay managers instead of doctors. The major problem is still that its underfunded - we're only just starting to spend the EU average on health, and we spend about half what the Americans do.

But simple workforce planning could make things so much better - if you cut one place at medical school for 5 years, you gain 250000, which is enough to employ a junior doctor for roughly 5 years.

Does anyone think that publicly funded health is sustainable in this way? Do we need market forces to keep it competitive? I used to think publicy funded was an ideal....but incompetence on a scale like this, and the recently announced training application schemes make me think that we might well not be.

i wonder if labour will eventually shut up passing the blame to the conservatives "it was under invested for years blah blah" -
YOU'VE BEEN IN POWER 10 YEARS.


Apparently, in the metro today, there's going to be short of doctors and nurses by 2011 as their cutting wage bills.

Re: State of the NHS

I love how people with an axe to grind always employ shit math/stats to 'prove' a point

Re: State of the NHS

One of my mates at work, his sister is a qualified nurse. She is moving to Australia for work.

Its not just the NHS which is a shambles tho, I'm at the Revenue at the mo and my contract is ending in MArch. But they are planning to axe 25,000 permanent staff aswell. Thats the government potentially sending 25000 people on the dole

The reasons that I shall not be voting for labour at the next election are:

1) Illegal invasion of Iraq (does anyone remember the final hour call that Saddam could avoid invasion if he gave up his WMD?)

2) Tony Blairs disgraceful failure to call for a cease-fire in the Israel/Lebanon conflict last year

3) The gross mismanagement of the NHS; specifically workforce management and specialty training reforms.

At the moment, the only credible alternative is Cameron.

I HAVE A FEW IDEAS OF WHO SHOULD BE IN CHARGE AND SORT THIS COUNTRY OUT

and he's a fuckin tool aswell.... bring back thatcher, its the only plausable option man.

I'm far closer to Lib Dem ideals than Conservative, but you seem to hear nothing from them these days, and I keep half an eye on the news. I think I'd be wasting a vote, and so far Cameron doesn't have any policies that I profoundly disagree with.

The problem with the NHS is that it needs more money, and it needs to be spent better. We shouldn't be spending the european average (finally), we should be much better than that - GDP is more than the european average.

The problem isn't pay for doctors and nurses either, for doctors in particular, they've all got straight As in everything, a heavyweight degree (usually 2 or 3) and the rest - if they wished, they could earn far more in business, so slash their wages and some'll either go abroad or change profession.

I think there may be too many managers; we should be looking at systems overseas that work better and learning lessons from them.

too many doctors become GPs - why? cause it's easy money doing the odd treatment and giving anti biotics to old biddies.

Well at least it mean't I didn't have to see pictures of Thatcher day in, day out .....oh wait a minute ..... :angry:

Happy New Year to you too Brid !!!

Well, if you listen to this report from the government, there aren't enough GPs! It's that the hospitals dont have enough money to pay for more consultants, which is absurd if they want to get waits down.

I'll ignore your slight at GPs and save my rebuttal for another day

i've worked with GPs - u know what? they're CUNTS. BIG FAT CUNTS who are so far up their own over paid, underworked arses youi wouldn't believe. having dealt with the NHS and GPs alot recently u really see what a fuck up it all is. GPs do NOTHING - they're glorified pharmacists who occasioanlly lance a few boils to get a few 314 claims in to make BUCKETS of money, all in the name of 'keeping waiting lists down' - THEN if they have anything important to do, what do they say "i'll send u to see a specialist" - which is usually ALL the time - and why? to cover their own arses so they don't get sued for mistreatment.

pppfffffffffttttt.

don't get me started on GP receptionists. they make thatcher look like a kids tv presenter!

Most GPs you talk to (and every hospital consultant) will think GPs are bring paid too much - but this was THIS governments fault - they negotiated the contract, and said that if GPs did some things better, they would get paid more. GPs did it a lot better than the government expected, and so got paid more.

General practice is a seriously challenging job - I mean, what are the symptoms of, say, lung cancer? Cough, phlegm, maybe a bit of blood, breathlessness? So what're the symptoms of a nasty chest infection? Exactly the same. You've got 5-10 minutes to decide which it is, and all you've got are your clinical skills and a stethoscope.

What about the young girl on the pill who comes in coughing? Could be an infection, could be a potentially fatal embolism. The baby with a rash? Could be baby eczema, could be meningitis. Again, 10 minutes to decide, repeat all morning - they do REMARKABLY well considering.

It's an enormous level of responsibility, and deserves to be well reimbursed (though perhaps not as well as it is!).

exactly - so they send you to a specialist - thats all they do. believe me.

responsibility my arse - they just don't want to get sued

Medicine is for gamblers If they sent everything that could be something serious to the specialists, the system would be swamped, really truly swamped. On the other hand, if there's a reasonable chance it is something dangerous, then they have to send it in, or they're not doing justice to the patient. They don't gamble on chance though - they use subtle clinical signs, 11 years training and an absolute ton of experience to evalute probabilities.

I don't doubt that some GPs out there are utterly crap, not dangerous per se, but if people are leaving feeling that they've not been listened to or taken seriously at the very least then that is a very clear failure on the part of that GP.

If this happens - you do what you do if you have a crap haircut, or a crap meal at a restaurant. Go to somewhere else, and look until you find someone excellent. The fewer patients the GP has on the list, the less they get paid.

i know this isn't really about GPs - but i bet if u ask most people what they think of their GP's - they're not happy. PLUS when they actually find out about the incentives the receive for doing 'minor surgeries' and other bonus payments - people would be shocked.


i've been over the last year to around 15 different appointments at 3 different hospitals/treatment centres, seeing i'd say 9 or 10 different consultants each time with my son, each time they ask the same questions and make the same basic tests - yet they've all say the same thing "we think there's nothing wrong but..." and tell me to see someone else. We think there's nothing wrong BUT you don't want to NOT listen to doctors. it seems like we're running around for no reason wasting OUR time AND the NHS's time and money for what? so they have covered their arses incase they've missed something.

it's symptomatic of this current climate where no-one wants to make a final desicision - they're scared incase they get into trouble rather than taking a bit of responsibility

What annoys me most about debates regarding the NHS, is that people only talk about the pay scales of doctors and nurses, like they were the only people working for the NHS ... what about the highly responsible job all the lab technicians have ... and the pennies they are paid for doing it ?????