What patients can expect as East Midlands Ambulance Service staff strike across Northamptonshire

What patients can expect as East Midlands Ambulance Service staff strike across Northamptonshire Paramedics and staff from East Midlands Ambulance Service (EMAS) staff will be on strike on Wednesday (December 21) in a dispute with the Government about pay.

The GMB trade union that represents EMAS staff received enough votes to mandate strike action, which will include Northamptonshire employees. EMAS says of its workforce of more than 4,000, the strike action could affect up to 50 percent. Northamptonshire Telegraph

Striking nurses hold vigil for mum and two children

Striking nurses hold vigil for mum and two children A group of nurses broke away from the picket line to hold a one-minute silence in memory of a colleague who died along with her two children.

Anju Asok, 35, Jeeva Saju, six, and Janvi Saju, four, were found with serious injuries at an address in Petherton Court, Kettering, Northamptonshire, on Thursday. BBC Northampton

Northampton General Hospital information champions do well in national awards

Northampton General Hospital information champions do well in national awards Work by information governance experts at Northampton General Hospital has been rated as some of the best in the country in a national awards scheme.

Sally Berrill, has won the Information Sharing Champion of the Year Award in the National Health and Social Care Strategic Information Governance Network Awards. News (dsptoolkit.nhs.uk). Northampton Chronicle and Echo

Managing expectations: the NHS’s challenging activity and efficiency targets

Managing expectations: the NHS’s challenging activity and efficiency targets The NHS in England approached the Autumn Statement amid deep concern over rising costs and alarming performance statistics. The extra £3.3bn allocated in 2023/24 and 2024/25 will have been greeted with relief. Although NHS England’s Chief Executive Amanda Pritchard said this funding should be ‘sufficient’ to fulfil the NHS’s key priorities, it is hard to overstate the scale of the task ahead. The Health Foundation

Recovering elective waits inclusively: where to start?

Recovering elective waits inclusively: where to start? Can the NHS effectively combine the aims of clearing the elective backlog and tackling health inequalities? It’s a question that systems and providers have been faced with since NHS England requested that recovery in the wake of the pandemic is managed inclusively. Some may think these aims are at odds with one another, while others will champion their unification. In the first stage of a new research project about inclusive approaches to reducing the backlog, we have been looking at what we can learn from NHS boards about how this issue is playing out. The King's Fund

Comparisons of all-cause mortality between European countries and regions: 28 December 2019 to week ending 1 July 2022

Comparisons of all-cause mortality between European countries and regions: 28 December 2019 to week ending 1 July 2022 Comparisons of all-cause excess mortality on a weekly basis since the start of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. Measures include relative age-standardised mortality rates and relative cumulative age-standardised mortality rates. Office for National Statistics

See also:

• The King’s Fund responds to latest ONS comparisons of all-cause mortality between European countries during the pandemic The King's Fund

Ambulance strike: Hospital chiefs warn of patient safety risk

Ambulance strike: Hospital chiefs warn of patient safety risk The risk to patients will only get worse unless the government reaches an agreement to prevent further strikes, NHS leaders have warned.

In a letter to the prime minister and health secretary, they said there was "deep worry" about Wednesday's strike.

People are being asked to only call 999 in a life-threatening emergency, but NHS England says emergency care will continue to be provided.

Ambulance response times are already twice as long as two years ago. BBC News

See also:

• Letter to Prime Minister on industrial action in the NHS: joint letter NHS Confederation and NHS Providers
• Ambulance strike: Union fury over minister Steve Barclay's claims BBC News
• Nurses' strike: 'If we have to, we'll continue to strike' BBC News
• Strike: What will ambulances respond to on Wednesday? BBC News
• Avoid contact sports during ambulance strikes, says minister BBC News
• Watch: On the picket line with nurses across the UK BBC News
• Rishi Sunak refusing to budge on pay as strike action escalates BBC News
• EVERYTHING you need to know about today's ambulance strike The Daily Mail
• Ambulance unions have made a choice to inflict harm on patients, warns Health Secretary The Daily Mail
• Don't get drunk over Christmas: Urgent NHS warning ahead of ambulance strikes The Daily Mail
• It is not the fault of unions if patients die during ambulance strikes, says union boss The Daily Telegraph
• 'We do this for you': nurses on picket line in Birmingham during NHS strikes – video The Guardian
• Deals struck to ensure ‘life and limb’ cover during NHS ambulance strike The Guardian
• Nurses’ action is part of UK’s biggest wave of strikes in a generation The Guardian
• Ambulance strikes: What are the demands and what is the government offering? The Independent
• Eight of England’s 10 ambulance services declare critical incidents ahead of paramedic strikes The Independent
• How can the NHS strikes be resolved? The New Statesman
• Ambulance workers stage mass walkout - as NHS leaders say they cannot guarantee patient safety Sky News

I’ve never seen the NHS pushed so hard. It’s not the system that’s breaking now, it’s the people

I’ve never seen the NHS pushed so hard. It’s not the system that’s breaking now, it’s the people | The Secret Consultant This week, the chair of the General Medical Council offered an extraordinary message of support to doctors. What was striking about this was not its tone, but its content. Nowhere was anything said about how to do our jobs, or how to be better doctors; the message was simple. It asked us to be compassionate and to be kind, to ourselves and to one another. The Guardian

A cure for long covid? Combination of concussion and ADHD drugs could treat brain fog and memory

A cure for long covid? Combination of concussion and ADHD drugs could treat brain fog and memory Two already-approved drugs may effectively treat the millions of Americans estimated to have long Covid.

Guanfacine, an Attention Deficit/Hyperactive Disorder (ADHD) drug sold under the name Tenex, and N-acetylcysteine (NAC), a concussion drug that is branded Mucomyst were found to reduce brain fog in two-thirds of patients. The Daily Mail

See also:

• Clinical experience with the α2A-adrenoceptor agonist, guanfacine, and N-acetylcysteine for the treatment of cognitive deficits in “Long-COVID19” (open access) Neuroimmunology Reports