Thursday 11 January 2018

Northampton General Hospital to buy care home places as winter pressures hit

Northampton General Hospital to buy care home places as winter pressures hit A hospital is to start paying for care home places for people waiting to leave the site in a bid to ease what it calls "severe" pressure on beds.

Northampton General Hospital said it needed to double the number of patients with complex needs who left the hospital each day.

Many patients are fit enough to leave hospital but are awaiting social care assessments from the county council.

The hospital said it would spend about £1m on the care home places. BBC Northampton

Northampton hospital let patient's children stay overnight to spend last Christmas with their mum

Northampton hospital let patient's children stay overnight to spend last Christmas with their mum A family were able to spend one last Christmas together, enjoy bacon sandwiches and unwrap gifts, thanks to the efforts of their care team at Northampton General Hospital.

Ward sister, Sarah Dainty, and her team on Spencer Ward brought Christmas forward to make sure her patient, who was receiving end-of-life care, could spend one last Christmas Day with her family. Northampton Chronicle and Echo

Residents withdrawn from Burton Latimer care home over management concerns

Residents withdrawn from Burton Latimer care home over management concerns A Burton Latimer care home at the centre of a police investigation into neglect allegations will be temporarily taken over by Northamptonshire County Council.

Two people were arrested last year after allegations were made over treatment at Latimer Grange Care Home in Station Road.

That investigation is ongoing but the county council has ended its contract with the home and is withdrawing residents who live there because of a number of concerns. Northamptonshire Telegraph

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NHS at watershed moment: NHS Providers letter to the secretary of state for health and social care

NHS at watershed moment: NHS Providers letter to the secretary of state for health and social care NHS Providers has written to the secretary of state for health and social care, Rt Hon Jeremy Hunt MP, today (11 January 2018), to outline concerns over the pressures being experienced by frontline health and care services this winter. The organisation, which represents 98% of hospital, mental health, community and ambulance service trusts in England, says this is a watershed moment for the NHS, and the government must accept that the service can no longer deliver what is required of it within current funding.

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Leading Large Scale Change: a practical guide: A guide to leading large scale change through complex health and social care environments

Leading Large Scale Change: a practical guide: A guide to leading large scale change through complex health and social care environments Leading Large Scale Change: a practical guide has been produced by the NHS England Sustainable Improvement Team and the Horizons Team, NHS England, to help all those involved in seeking to achieve transformational change in complex health and care environments. This guide has been fully revised from the original 2011 publication to reflect latest policy and practice. This guide has a number of different resources which can be used according to local needs and circumstances and has been designed to be interactive, offering many links to useful, external sources.

How your organisation can prepare for changes to data regulations under GDPR

How your organisation can prepare for changes to data regulations under GDPR Our Changes to data protection under GDPR factsheet, developed in conjunction with Capsticks, national specialists in healthcare employment law, outlines the key changes in the regulations. NHS Employers

Taking the temperature of nursing in the 21st century

Taking the temperature of nursing in the 21st century Nursing is no longer just a calling – it’s a profession. From running surgeries, to working in multi-disciplinary teams in the community, to carrying out medical procedures, nurses are at the forefront of care, says Kim Thomas

Nicole Broadbent, 28, is a neonatal staff nurse at the Royal Free London hospital, so her patients – premature babies who require intensive care – are tiny and vulnerable. “It’s a hugely responsible job, but also a satisfying one,” she says. “It’s amazing how a 24-week-old baby can be so sick, but then, three, four months down the line, you can see them going home. They fascinate you on a daily basis.”

Neonatal nursing is no ordinary job, requiring a high degree of both skill and commitment. Broadbent was a ballet teacher until a serious ankle injury led her into nursing, via a degree course at Bucks New University. She now finds herself in a professional role that requires familiarity with technology, decision-making abilities and the warmth and empathy to support worried parents. Continue reading... The Guardian

Shifting care closer to home will ease pressure on hospitals

Shifting care closer to home will ease pressure on hospitals | Ewan King There is growing evidence that a greater focus on prevention and self-care reduces demands on the NHS. We need to build on what works.

New year is associated with hope and optimism. But for the NHS, the headlines tell a different story: hospitals at full capacity. As you might expect, these articles focus on what is going wrong: headlines such as “NHS in crisis”, stories of beds in corridors and stressed-out nurses. Clearly these problems are real, but focusing only on hospitals won’t solve the problem. We need to think more broadly if we are to find lasting solutions; we must think about prevention, and how far it is embedded in local systems.

For some time, health and care reforms have been about shifting care closer to home. The programme of vanguards and sustainability and transformation plans was intended to herald a greater focus on prevention and self-care to reduce pressure on hospitals. There is some evidence that these reforms are working: Hertfordshire’s prevention-focused Better Care for Care Home Residents Vanguard, for instance, led to a 45% reduction in hospital admissions and A&E attendances between April 2015 and May last year. Continue reading... The Guardian

NHS cancer hospital may have to delay or reduce treatment

NHS cancer hospital may have to delay or reduce treatment Leaked memo says nursing shortage means patients could have to wait longer for chemotherapy, or be given less treatment

An NHS cancer hospital may have to make patients wait to undergo chemotherapy, or reduce the amount of treatment that dying patients receive, because it has so few nurses, a leaked memo has revealed.

Macmillan Cancer Support said the prospect of the Churchill hospital in Oxford in effect rationing life-extending and potentially life-saving chemotherapy was “deeply worrying”, especially for people dying of the disease.

The UK has fewer doctors and nurses than many other comparable countries both in Europe and worldwide. According to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), Britain comes 24th in a league table of 34 member countries in terms of the number of doctors they have relative to their populations. Greece, Austria and Norway have the most; the three countries with proportionately the fewest medics are Turkey, Chile and Mexico. Jeremy Hunt, the health secretary, regularly points out that the NHS in England has more doctors and nurses than when the Conservatives came to power in 2010. That is true, although there are now fewer district nurses, mental health nurses and other types of health professionals. Continue reading... The Guardian

Aussie flu is more severe than the Swine flu, expert warns

Aussie flu is more severe than the Swine flu, expert warns The dreaded 'Aussie flu' is more severe than the Swine flu pandemic of 2009 which killed nearly 300,000 people across the world, an expert has warned.

Peter Horby, professor of emerging infectious diseases and global health at Oxford University, believes this winter 'may well be worse than others'.

His fears come amid the emergence of H3N2, an aggressive strain of influenza A that rocked Australia during its winter and triggered triple the usual number of cases. The Daily Mail