Direct route to Northampton A&E will close next month for building work

Direct route to Northampton A&E will close next month for building work A main entrance to Northampton General Hospital will be closed next month while developers crane in pieces of a new building.

The Cliftonville entrance to the hospital, off Billing Road, will be closed to all vehicles except ambulances between November 13 and December 11. Northampton Chronicle and Echo 

Sustainable primary care provides a platform for system change

Sustainable primary care provides a platform for system change In the final blog in our series about the transformation of the Canterbury health system in New Zealand, Vince Barry, Chief Executive of Pegasus Health, looks at how building sustainable primary care creates a platform for change. The King's Fund

Thriving at Work: a review of mental health and employers

Thriving at Work: a review of mental health and employers Thriving at Work sets out what employers can do to better support all employees, including those with mental health problems to remain in and thrive through work.

It includes a detailed analysis that explores the significant cost of poor mental health to UK businesses and the economy as a whole. Poor mental health costs employers between £33 billion and £42 billion a year, with an annual cost to the UK economy of between £74 billion and £99 billion.

The review quantifies how investing in supporting mental health at work is good for business and productivity. The most important recommendation is that all employers, regardless of size or industry, should adopt 6 ‘mental health core standards’ that lay basic foundations for an approach to workplace mental health. It also details how large employers and the public sector can develop these standards further through a set of ‘mental health enhanced standards’. The review also makes a series of recommendations to government and other bodies. Department of Health & Department for Work and Pensions

See also:

• 300,000 people lose jobs each year due to poor mental health BBC News
• Mental health sick notes should ease people back to work, says Government-commissioned report The Daily Telegraph
• Mental health problems are forcing thousands in UK out of work – report The Guardian
• Up to 300,000 people with long-term mental health issues lose their jobs each year OnMedica

The non-executive director's guide to NHS data: part one

The non-executive director's guide to NHS data: part one This briefing is the first in a new series of guides to be launched by the NHS Confederation in association with healthcare intelligence provider CHKS. The guides are for non-executive directors (NEDs) and aim to show how data can be used to drive improvement, provide effective oversight and support the transformation of care. The first guide considers data in acute care settings. It will be followed by a further three publications over 2017/18. NHS Confederation

People like us? Understanding complaints about paramedics and social workers

People like us? Understanding complaints about paramedics and social workers This research, carried out by the University of Surrey, sets out to improve understanding of the reasons for the disproportionately high number and nature of complaints to the HCPC about two professions - paramedics from across the UK, and social workers in England. It also considers what preventative action could be taken to address the issues and themes brought out in the report. Health & Care Professions Council

Hospital backs away from 'Airbnb beds' plan

Hospital backs away from 'Airbnb beds' plan A hospital has backed down over plans for patients to recuperate in people's homes as part of an Airbnb-style trial.

Southend Hospital in Essex said it has no plans to "support the pilot at this time".

The trial by healthcare start-up CareRooms involves 30 hospital patients staying in local residents' spare rooms while waiting to be discharged. BBC News

See also:

• Southend hospital set to pilot Airbnb-style scheme BBC News
• Airbnb-style stays for recuperating patients to ease hospital bed-blocking The Daily Telegraph
• NHS may rent spare rooms to ease bed crisis The Guardian

Patients face 'distressing readmissions'

Patients face 'distressing readmissions' The number of patients in England being readmitted to hospital within 30 days of discharge has risen by nearly a quarter in the last four years, a watchdog has said.

Figures compiled by Healthwatch suggest one in five of these potentially distressing readmissions happen 48 hours after being sent home.

The watchdog warns patients may be being rushed out early.

NHS England says it is impossible to know the reasons for the readmissions.

An emergency readmission occurs when a patient needs to go back into hospital unexpectedly for further treatment, within 30 days of having been discharged.

Readmissions in such a short space of time raise concerns about patients being discharged unsafely, and about the pressure on hospitals to free up beds. BBC News

NHS cost cutting leaving disabled people 'interned' in care homes

NHS cost cutting leaving disabled people 'interned' in care homes Disabled people in the UK face being “interned” in care homes due to NHS cost-cutting measures, in what amounts to a potential breach of their human rights, it has emerged.

The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) has warned a new policy that caps funding for NHS care outside hospital means disabled people may be prevented from living at home with their families despite being well enough to do so.

Out of hospital care, known as continuing healthcare, can be arranged in a care home, nursing home, hospice or a person’s own home. But the EHRC said the new funding caps, which have been rolled out in at least 44 Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs) across the UK, set an upper limit on the provision of care in a person’s home, which for many is not sufficient to meet their care needs. The Independent

To those who take antibiotics – the resistance crisis is not your fault | Hannah Flynn

To those who take antibiotics – the resistance crisis is not your fault | Hannah Flynn A new government campaign suggesting that growing antimicrobial resistance is the fault of patients is lazy and dishonest

Singing and dancing pills are the latest weapon to be pulled out of the NHS’s public health armoury, in a last-ditch battle to beat antibiotic resistance. The animated capsules are featured in Public Health England’s Keep Antibiotics Working campaign, which was unveiled earlier this week, and aims to encourage patients to use fewer antibiotics. Yet like all other attempts to curb the impending antibiotic Armageddon, it will fail. Why? Because it is based on the lazy assumption that patients are to blame.

We should be in a strong position to curb the threat of antimicrobial resistance in the UK, as our comparatively non-interventionist approach to illness (necessitated by having one of the lowest spends per capita on healthcare in the western world) has meant we have a much stronger grip on prescribing than many other places. This is admirable and should be celebrated more than it is, yet this is exactly why a campaign encouraging people to use fewer antibiotics is destined to fail. Patients aren’t the decision-makers here.

Using antibiotics as growth agents has been banned in the EU since 2006, but it isn’t in the US Continue reading... The Guardian

See also:

•  Antibiotic resistance could spell end of modern medicine, says chief medic The Guardian

Sick children like my daughter don't get enough information – so I made an app

Sick children like my daughter don't get enough information – so I made an app When my daughter had cancer she was told nothing about hospital environments or her treatment. I want to use her experience to benefit others

Tuesday 29 November 2011 was the darkest of days. On that day six years ago, my wife and I listened in stunned silence as we were given the news that our 13-year-old daughter, Issy, had a rare bone cancer called Ewing’s sarcoma.

That was the start of a year of treatment that involved six hospitals, 18 rounds of chemotherapy, numerous blood transfusions, a failed stem cell harvest, an operation to remove her sacrum and an eight-week NHS-funded trip to the US, where she received proton beam therapy. Continue reading... The Guardian

'Attention seekers' cost the NHS £1.7 million a year

'Attention seekers' cost the NHS £1.7 million a year 'Attention seekers' who pretend to be ill are costing the NHS £1.7million a year, official figures reveal.

The number of hospital beds taken up by patients with fake disorders has more than trebled in the past decade, according to NHS Digital statistics. Each faker is estimated to cost the NHS between £800 to £900 a day.

Experts believe the problem is driven by 'Dr Google' as people can readily access medical information to fool doctors into believing they are unwell.

Nearly 100 people were treated for Munchausen's syndrome by the NHS between 2015 and 2016, resulting in a cumulative 1,966 days in hospital, figures add. Munchausen's syndrome is a psychological disorder where someone pretends to be ill. The Daily Mail