Wednesday 20 August 2014

NHS Nene in Northamptonshire brings strict cost controls - BBC News

NHS Nene in Northamptonshire brings strict cost controls Better control of costs for people in Northamptonshire needing continuing care helped a clinical commissioning group (CCG) avoid a £39.9m overspend, according to its first annual report. BBC Northamptonshire

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Patient safety in private hospitals - the known and the unknown risks

Patient safety in private hospitals - the known and the unknown risks Patients undergoing operations in private hospitals may be put at risk from inadequate equipment, lack of intensive care beds, unsafe staffing arrangements, and poor medical record-keeping according to a new report from the Centre for Health and the Public Interest.

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Update on Urgent and Emergency Care Review

Update on Urgent and Emergency Care Review Today NHS England has published an update on the Urgent and Emergency Care Review, which builds on NHS England’s future vision for urgent and emergency care in Transforming urgent and emergency care services in England. Urgent and Emergency Care Review End of Phase 1 Report.

This work will make it easier for patients to get the right care, in the right place, first time. The vision is simple: firstly, for those people with urgent but non-life threatening needs we must provide highly responsive, effective and personalised services outside of hospital - as close to people’s homes as possible, minimising disruption and inconvenience for patients and their families. Secondly, for those people with life threatening needs we should ensure they are treated in centres with the very best expertise and facilities.

This update sets out what the Review has been doing since we last reported in November 2013. It reports on progress with NHS England’s work with local commissioners and the development of their five year strategic and two year operational plans as well as updates on planning to develop demonstrator sites to trial new models, including the new NHS 111 service specification.

To underpin these changes, a new approach to reimbursing providers of health and care services is essential. Today NHS England and Monitor have therefore also published a discussion documentsetting out the options for payment to kick off discussion.

Numbers using NHS Stop Smoking Services in decline for the second year

Numbers using NHS Stop Smoking Services in decline for the second year Success rate remains stable with over 50 per cent giving up smoking. Health & Social Care Information Centre

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Mental health care 'in dark ages'

Mental health care 'in dark ages' Mental health services for young people in England are "stuck in the dark ages" and "not fit for purpose", according to a government minister. BBC News

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Income from private patients soars at NHS hospital trusts

Income from private patients soars at NHS hospital trusts NHS trusts accused of exploiting raised limit on numbers of paying patients amid health service's 'creeping privatisation'

Some of Britain's leading hospitals stand accused of exploiting the coalition's controversial lifting of the cap on the number of private patients they can treat to increase their income as part of a "creeping privatisation" of the NHS.

As new figures show that some hospitals have seen a big increase of up to 40% in their private income since the cap was lifted, Labour accused ministers of presiding over a scandal of declining standards for NHS patients while allowing paying patients to enjoy high standards of care. Continue reading... The Guardian

Life on Ebola front line

Learning disabled not being discharged into the community

Learning disabled not being discharged into the community In spite of the Winterbourne View scandal too many patients still face hospital rather than community treatment. OnMedica

Guidelines to ensure safe staffing levels in the NHS fall short

Guidelines to ensure safe staffing levels in the NHS fall short The Nice guidelines omit recommendations for minimum nurse staffing levels and much more is needed.

In July the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (Nice) issued guidance on safe nurse staffing for hospitals in England. This work was commissioned by the government in response to recommendations in the Francis inquiry into the mid-Staffordshire NHS trust. Nice recommended a systematic approach to matching nurse staffing to patient need, using red-flag indicators to detect staffing shortfalls. A ratio of 1:8 is cited as a high-risk level that should trigger urgent review. But it did not offer guidance on the minimum nurse staffing levels needed to deliver safe or high quality patient care.

Writing in the Guardian, economist Graham Cookson says that to do so would have been a mistake. In contrast Roy Lilley, an experienced NHS manager describes Nices failure to do so as ridiculous. Legally binding minimum levels, adjusted for specialty, that can be flexed up (but never down) are essential, he argues; we have minimum ratios for airlines, crèches, and football grounds, so why not hospital wards? Certainly the call for minimum nurse-to-patient ratios in the UK is getting louder. The Royal College of Nursing congress has voted for mandated minimums, and a Unison survey found 92% supported minimum staffing levels. A new law on minimum nurse staffing levels is now proposed in Wales. So did Nice get it right in not setting minimums for England, or is their guidance, as Roy Lilley puts it, as useful as a chocolate tea-pot? Continue reading... The Guardian

Stroke patients are more likely to die if fewer nurses at weekends

Heart disease rates fall across Europe

Heart disease rates fall across Europe Deaths from heart disease and strokes are declining across Europe, thanks to falling smoking rates and the use of preventative statins, according to a major new report. The Independent

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Revealed: The most devastating failures by public services

Revealed: The most devastating failures by public services A woman whose husband died hours after one of England’s biggest NHS hospitals missed several chances to diagnose his fatal condition was given just £2,000 in compensation, according to files published today, that highlight “devastating” failures by public services. The Independent

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