New role created at Northampton General Hospital for victims of domestic violence

New role created at Northampton General Hospital for victims of domestic violence Northampton General Hospital has created a new role to strengthen the support it gives to patients at risk of domestic abuse .

Claire, an Independent Domestic Violence Advisor (IDVA) working for Northamptonshire Sunflower Centre, is now based at the hospital to offer advice and guidance to adults who have experienced domestic abuse and are at risk of injury, harm or homicide.

Claire will also introduce new training for our staff to help them to recognise signs of abuse and to act safely and appropriately to signpost and support them.

She will be based initially in the hospital's maternity offices working alongside the hospital's safeguarding midwives. Northants Herald and Post

See also:

• New hospital-based role to support patients at risk of domestic abuse Northampton General Hospital

Guidance: Safer maternity care

Guidance: Safer maternity care  The Safer Maternity Care action plan from the Department of Health is part of the national ambition to halve rates of stillbirths, neonatal deaths, maternal deaths and brain injuries that occur during or shortly after birth, by 2030.

It is supported by a national package of measures and funding including:

• an £8 million maternity safety training fund to support trusts to drive improvements in maternity safety
• the launch of ‘Our Chance’ campaign, targeted towards pregnant women and their families to raise awareness of the symptoms that can lead to stillbirth
• a £250,000 maternity safety innovation fund to support local maternity services to create and pilot new ideas
• a new National Quality Improvement Programme for all trusts.
• Maternity ratings for clinical commissioning groups across England will be published to benchmark local areas, help identify those areas needing improvement and examples of the best practice

Open consultation: Providing a 'safe space' in healthcare safety investigations

Open consultation: Providing a 'safe space' in healthcare safety investigations The proposal outlined in this consultation will legally ensure that information that staff provide as part of a health service investigation will be kept confidential except where there is an immediate risk to patient safety, or where the High Court makes an order permitting disclosure. This broadly mirrors the procedures followed in air accidents investigations. Department of Health

The NHS partners with Twitter to help shed light on what it means to work or be a patient in the NHS

The NHS partners with Twitter to help shed light on what it means to work or be a patient in the NHS A pioneering new initiative to lift the lid on the NHS through the voices of the people on its frontline goes live today with the launch of the @NHS Twitter account.

A UK first, @NHS will see a different NHS patient or member of its 1.3 million staff become curator each week over a three month pilot and report first hand their experiences of the health service. NHS England

Inquiry call over NHS health provider's finances

Inquiry call over NHS health provider's finances An MP is demanding the health secretary investigates how a private firm running dozens of GP surgeries and NHS walk-in centres is handling its finances.

Integral Medical Holdings (IMH), which controls 50 NHS sites, swapped its debts for loan notes to its parent company, which is based in The Bahamas.

It essentially means taxpayers' money given to IMH ends up paying off interest of 20%.

IMH said the system allowed flexibility over when debts were repaid. BBC News

Sussex NHS mental health trust criticised over killings by patients

Sussex NHS mental health trust criticised over killings by patients A mental health trust underestimated the risk posed by its patients and sometimes did not act on threats to kill, a review of 10 killings over eight years has found.

The review examined deaths linked to Sussex Partnership NHS Foundation Trust patients between 2007 and 2015.

It found killings by Kayden Smith in 2012 and Roger Goswell in 2007 had been "preventable" and "predictable".

The trust has apologised and offered its condolences to families. BBC News

See also:

• An independent thematic review ofinvestigations into the care and treatment provided to service users who committed ahomicide and to a victim of homicide Sussex
  Partnership NHS Foundation Trust
• Sussex deaths BBC News
• Review of 10 killings uncovers failings at NHS mental health trust that 'severely underestimated' risk posed by patients The Daily Telegraph
• NHS trust criticised for underestimating risk posed by patients who killed people The Guardian
• NHS Trust criticised for failings after 'killings' involving people with links to its mental health services ITV News

Ambulance patients face long A&E delays

Ambulance patients face long A&E delays Thousands of patients taken to hospital by ambulance face long delays before being seen by accident and emergency staff, figures for England show. BBC News

Threat to name NHS trusts over high agency spending

Threat to name NHS trusts over high agency spending NHS bosses are threatening to "name and shame" trusts in England as they try to crack down on agency spending. BBC News

Every 1% saved from chaotic NHS procurement could save £220m

Every 1% saved from chaotic NHS procurement could save £220m If health secretary Jeremy Hunt took a tougher line over procurement, the millions saved could pay for thousands more junior doctors

Last week, when she met Simon Stevens, the chief executive of NHS England, prime minister Theresa May dashed any hopes of a cash boost in next month’s autumn statement.

But there is one area of NHS England spending that has not yet come sufficiently under the microscope: procurement. Every 1% reduction – a reasonably conservative target – in hospital trusts’ annual procurement expenditure of £22bn could, for instance, pay for more than 4,000 extra junior doctors. Continue reading... The Guardian

Hospital deficits could force NHS to divert money meant for improving care

Hospital deficits could force NHS to divert money meant for improving care Trusts in England will have £5.4bn made available to them until 2019 to help wipe out deficits, threatening plans to overhaul delivery of care, says thinktank

The NHS expects hospitals to go on racking up such large deficits in the next few years that it will have to divert £5.4bn earmarked for improving patient care to prop them up, experts claim.

NHS trusts in England, which recorded a collective deficit of £2.45bn last year, are meant to reduce their overspending this year to only £580m to help tackle the service’s acute financial problems. Continue reading... The Guardian

Third of people worry the NHS will share their personal data

Third of people worry the NHS will share their personal data More than 2,000 British adults were surveyed for a European-wide campaign known as eTRIKS - which tries to increase the sharing of patient data among scientific studies for medical breakthroughs. The Daily Mail