Monday 5 March 2018

Shock figures reveal Corby is the suicide capital of England

Shock figures reveal Corby is the suicide capital of England Death records have revealed the suicide capital of England.

Some of the nation's favourite seaside resorts feature at the top of the list - while Corby had the highest rate in the entire country.

Government statistics, crunched by MailOnline, reveal 17.5 people in every 10,000 commit suicide in the Northamptonshire town.

Corby was hit by the decline of its steel industry in the 1980s which saw thousands of people in the town being made redundant.

Figures from the Office of National Statistics (ONS) show that in the last three years there were a total of 14,277 deaths classified as suicides.

But they also show a huge variation across the country - with some parts of England having three times the suicide rate of others. The Daily Mail

Old, disabled and poor will feel impact of Northants County Council belt-tightening budget

Old, disabled and poor will feel impact of Northants County Council belt-tightening budget The brunt of the of the drastic cuts to Northamptonshire County Council’s budget will be borne by the old, the disabled, the poor and the young.

The council’s own damning analysis of its sweeping cuts is detailed in its Equality Impact Assessments (EIAs) written by its own officers. Northampton Chronicle and ECHO

Medication without harm: A challenge for social care as well as the NHS

Medication without harm: A challenge for social care as well as the NHS In March 2017, the World Health Organisation (WHO) launched its third Global Patient Safety Challenge, Medication Without Harm, with the ambitious goal of reducing avoidable medication-related harm by 50% worldwide over the next five years.

This ambitious challenge was taken up last week by Jeremy Hunt, the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care. Speaking at the World Patient Safety, Science and Technology Summit, he highlighted that an estimated 237 million drug errors occur each year in England, and set out new proposals to tackle what he described as ‘appalling levels of harm and death that are totally avoidable’. The government’s new proposals include accelerating the rollout of electronic prescribing systems in hospitals, decriminalising errors by pharmacists to encourage learning and transparency, and expanding the use of PINCER, an IT tool recently supported by the Health Foundation that identifies patients at risk of hazardous prescribing. 

Transforming children and young people’s mental health provision – our response

Transforming children and young people’s mental health provision – our response In January 2017, Theresa May announced the government’s intention to publish a Green Paper on children and young people’s mental health tackling the burning injustice of poor mental health care. The Green Paper Transforming children and young people’s mental health provision was published at the end of 2017, and a subsequent consultation paper outlines how the government intends to achieve this. The King's Fund

Is it wrong to be blunt about obesity?

Is it wrong to be blunt about obesity? When Cancer Research this week revealed that millennials are set to become the most overweight generation since records began, there was a key message - after smoking, obesity is the second biggest cause of cancer.

It called for a ban on junk food advertising and urged people to eat healthier, more balanced diets.

But not everyone appreciated the tone of the message.

The award-winning Danish comedian Sofie Hagen, who lives in London and has written for the BBC about her social anxiety, took to Twitter to criticise the campaign, which she said was "incredibly damaging". BBC News

Admissions to hospital for drug-related mental health problems soar

Admissions to hospital for drug-related mental health problems soar NHS hospitals in England treating twice as many people with drug-related disorders as they did 10 years ago

Soaring numbers of children, young people and pensioners in England are being taken to hospital after suffering serious mental disorders as a result of taking drugs, NHS figures reveal.

Hospitals are treating more than double the number of people for what the NHS calls “drug-related mental and behavioural disorders” than they did 10 years ago. Continue reading... The Guardian

Britain's contaminated blood scandal: ‘I need them to admit they killed our son’

Britain's contaminated blood scandal: ‘I need them to admit they killed our son’ In the 1970s and 80s, 4,689 British haemophiliacs were treated with contaminated blood products. So far, more than half of them have died. The government knew there were risks involved. The patients didn’t. Will they ever get justice?

It has been called the biggest treatment disaster in the history of the NHS, and a “horrific human tragedy”. But Su Gorman, whose husband has endured years of ill health as a result of haemophilia treatment, does not believe this adequately describes Britain’s contaminated blood scandal. As far as she is concerned, it is simply a crime.

In the 1970s and 80s, 4,689 haemophiliacs became infected with hepatitis C and HIV after they were treated with contaminated blood products supplied by the NHS. Of those infected, 2,883 have since died.

Waiting for the result, I lived in fear. We had friends dying of Aids, so no illusions about what the endgame would be

At every single stage, the truth has been there and people have evaded it, and that must carry a penalty

They told us in the hospital corridor, with kids running past. Just, ‘Oh, by the way, Colin has tested positive for HIV' Continue reading... The Guardian

Hospitals that refuse surgery to smokers and obese patients slammed

Hospitals that refuse surgery to smokers and obese patients slammed NHS hospitals that refuse surgery to smokers and obese patients are ‘draconian and discriminatory’, doctors warned last night.

The Academy of Medical Royal Colleges criticised the policies, which were introduced in some clinical commissioning groups last October.

Professor Derek Alderson, president of the Royal College of Surgeons, said people in need of medical help will be left in pain as they are forced to wait for treatment. The Daily Mail

See also:

NHS launches a 'one-stop' service to diagnose prostate cancer

NHS launches a 'one-stop' service to diagnose prostate cancer A ‘one-stop’ service to revolutionise prostate cancer treatment has been launched by the Health Service.

The quick-access programme slashes the time taken for a diagnosis from around six weeks to just days.

Patients have all their tests in one day, rather than several. And doctors use the latest MRI scanners and techniques to search for the disease with far greater accuracy than before.

Doctors hope to test 5,000 men over the next two years in the £1.6million trial.

Campaigners say it is the biggest leap forward in prostate cancer diagnosis for decades. The Daily Mail