The Spending Round: what does it mean for health and care?

The Spending Round: what does it mean for health and care? Among all the constitutional excitement happening in Whitehall, the Chancellor has published the Spending Round for 2020/21. But what does the announcement mean for health and care? The King’s Fund has repeatedly talked about three main priorities for health and care for the new Prime Minister – workforce, public health and adult social care, so let’s look at each in turn. (A fourth, capital, is outside of the Spending Round remit this time because these budgets have already been set for 2020/21). The King's Fund

See also:

• Sadly missed opportunity to reverse cuts - Nuffield Trust response to Spending Round Nuffield Trust
• Spending Round 2019: document HM Treasury
• Spending Round 2019: what you need to know HM Treasury
• Spending plan: What it means for health and care BBC News
• Javid unveils short-term social care funding boost in spending review Community Care
• Sajid Javid promises largest spending rise in more than 15 years The Guardian

‘NHS Passports’ to help staff work flexibly and cut admin costs

‘NHS Passports’ to help staff work flexibly and cut admin costs Health service staff in England will be able to move seamlessly between sites in a bid to make it easier to take on new roles, plug gaps in staffing and improve patients’ care.

Following successful pilot projects, all hospitals in England are being urged to sign-up to passporting agreements, which will cut the need for up to two-day inductions and other admin when staff move between organisations.

All clinicians working in hospitals that have these agreements will be able to move across different NHS sites to offer care to patients before returning to their main trust. NHS England

See also:

• All NHS staff could get 'passports' to allow them to work in ANY hospital at short notice The Daily Mail

No deal Brexit: issues, impacts and implications

No deal Brexit: issues, impacts and implications This report shows that once the UK is outside the Article 50 framework it will be far harder, and take far longer, to get a deal with the EU. It includes a discussion on how health care will be affected. This includes how co-ordination of social security will immediately cease. Cross-border health care rests on this which means planned treatment in other member states will be disrupted. In addition to this, the European Health Insurance Card for emergency treatment will no longer function. The UK in a Changing Europe

GPs are ignoring new mothers' mental health, says parenting charity

GPs are ignoring new mothers' mental health, says parenting charity Many are given little or no time to discuss feelings at postnatal checkup, NCT survey finds

Mental health problems among new mothers are going undetected because many get as little as three minutes to discuss their feelings at the six-week postnatal checkup, research claims.

A sixth of mothers were given no time at all to talk about their health at the appointments, while 31% had less than three minutes, according to the survey by the parenting charity NCT. A quarter of the 1,025 women polled, who all gave birth in the last two years, were not asked anything about their emotional or mental wellbeing. The Guardian

See also:

• The half hidden: bringing postnatal mental illness out of hiding (report) NCT
• Hidden Half campaign NCT
• Six-week check for new mothers must be funded, says RCGP Royal College of General Practitioners 
• GPs are 'neglecting' almost HALF of new mothers by failing to discuss their health after childbirth The Daily Mail

The Big Hospital Experiment review – can a volunteer army save the NHS?

The Big Hospital Experiment review – can a volunteer army save the NHS? Although this documentary is warm and heartfelt, the central premise – using an unpaid workforce to paper over cracks in the health service – may leave you queasy

The Big Hospital Experiment (BBC Two) is a lovely and heartfelt documentary about community, volunteering and the power of shared humanity, and within a few moments of it starting, I was furious. The cameras follow 14 young men and women who have signed up to work in the Royal Derby hospital for six weeks. The Guardian

Statins to be made available over the counter by pharmacists, NHS chief executive announces

Statins to be made available over the counter by pharmacists, NHS chief executive announces Statins are to be made available over the counter by pharmacists, in a bid to prevent thousands of heart attacks and strokes, the chief executive of the NHS has announced.

It is estimated nearly 8 million adults in the UK currently take the statins, but millions more are still at risk because they do not take the drug.

The decision could help those millions of patients get easier access to the lifesaving medicine. The Daily Telegraph

See also:

• Plans to make statins available over-the-counter should be approached with caution, says RCGP Royal College of General Practitioners
• Pharmacies could start selling high-strength statins without prescription The Daily Mail
• GPs alarmed over NHS plans to allow chemists to dispense statins The Guardian

THIRD of cancer patients still have to go to their GP at least TWICE before hospital tests

THIRD of cancer patients still have to go to their GP at least TWICE before hospital tests The National Cancer Patient Experience Survey, completed by 70,000 cancer sufferers, found a small number of patients were still visiting the doctor five or more times before being referred to hospital. The Daily Mail

See also:

• National Cancer Patient Experience Survey 2018 - National and Local data NHS England

Healthy New Towns: how the NHS can help create healthy places

Healthy New Towns: how the NHS can help create healthy places We have been working with NHS England over the past 18 months, along with colleagues at the Town and Country Planning Association and The Young Foundation, to draw out the learning from NHS England’s Healthy New Towns programme. This has resulted in the publication of Putting health into place, which presents learning from the programme as practical guidance for local areas, and we will continue to play a role in supporting its implementation. The King's Fund

Nursing students are still dropping out in worrying numbers

Nursing students are still dropping out in worrying numbers Analysis by Nursing Standard and the Health Foundation shows a quarter of all nursing students are leaving or suspending their degrees before graduation.

See also:

• How many nursing students are leaving or suspending their degrees before graduation? The Health Foundation

New HIV diagnoses fall by a third in the UK since 2015

New HIV diagnoses fall by a third in the UK since 2015 Data by Public Health England (PHE) reveal that new HIV diagnoses in the UK have fallen to their lowest level since 2000. New diagnoses fell by almost a third (28%) from 6,271 in 2015 to 4,484 in 2018.

RCGP calls for 5,000 GPs to be trained a year to meet workforce targets and safeguard patient care

RCGP calls for 5,000 GPs to be trained a year to meet workforce targets and safeguard patient care Currently, there are 3,500 placements for GP training a year - and this year, more junior doctors have chosen to specialise in general practice than ever before - but the College says these numbers must increase to at least 5,000 a year as soon as possible, and for this to be funded appropriately. Royal College of General Practitioners

See also:

• NHS needs 5,000 trainee doctors a year, says GPs' leader The Guardian

Unrelieved pain in palliative care in England

Unrelieved pain in palliative care in England This study estimates that currently there are approximately 125,971 end-of-life patients receiving, or in need of, palliative care suffering from unrelieved pain. Of these, an estimated 16,130 patients experience no relief from their pain at all in the last three months of life. Some of these patients suffer unnecessarily because of variations in the quality of care across care settings, for example, hospice versus at home services). Office of Health Economics

Suicide rate rises for first time since 2013

Suicide rate rises for first time since 2013 The suicide rate in the UK has risen for the first time since 2013, official figures show.

Office for National Statistics data for 2018 showed 11.2 deaths from suicide per 100,000 people - up from 10.1 in 2017.

Changes to the way suicides are recorded were brought in midway through last year and may account for some of the rise, the ONS says.

However, the suicide rate is still lower than its 1980s peak. BBC News

See also:

• Quarterly suicide death registrations in England: 2001 to 2018 registrations and 2019 provisional data Office for National Statistics
• Suicides in the UK: 2018 registrations Office for National Statistics
• Suicide prevention profile: September 2019 update Public Health England
• Amount of young people committing suicide in Britain is at a record high The Daily Mail
• Male suicides in record spike amid concern deaths were being wrongly recorded The Daily Telegraph

Cancer 'biggest middle-age killer in rich nations'

Cancer 'biggest middle-age killer in rich nations' Cancer now causes more deaths among the middle-aged in higher-income countries than cardiovascular disease, a study suggests.

Globally, heart problems and stroke is the leading cause of death at this age.

But the researchers say people in rich nations are 2.5 times more likely to die of cancer than cardiovascular disease in their middle years.

In poorer nations, the reverse is true - with cardiovascular disease three times more likely to claim the lives. BBC News

See also:

• Cancer's global epidemiological transition and growth (open access) The Lancet

Violence in the NHS: staff face routine assault and intimidation

Violence in the NHS: staff face routine assault and intimidation Lack of training and prosecutions, and workforce shortages, are placing staff in greater danger, say health unions

When Dr Miranda Roland, an A&E registrar, was held hostage by a patient brandishing a pair of steel surgical scissors in a cubicle, she didn’t panic. Moments earlier, she had gone in to check on the young patient, who was having a mental health episode after taking drugs, and had closed the door behind her. Although she was alone, Roland thought she was safe – all sharp and dangerous objects had been removed. Unfortunately, the patient had managed to hide a pair of scissors, which she pulled out before backing the doctor into a corner. “I was able to keep calm and talk her out of stabbing me,” Roland recalls. “I was lucky. It was that tense, it could have gone either way.” The Guardian

Violence in mental health can't be ignored, but nor can the pain of punitive policies

Violence in mental health can't be ignored, but nor can the pain of punitive policies | Peter Beresford Modern understanding of disability takes account of the barriers people face. Let’s do the same for mental health policy

When Anna became physically unwell as a student, her GP referred her to a psychiatrist and she agreed to voluntary treatment. After interviewing her for less than an hour, the psychiatrist diagnosed her with schizophrenia and told her there was a risk she would kill her mother.

“I have never been violent in my life, ever,” she says. But for 35 years Anna has had to live with this information, knowing it is written in her medical records and has limited her life opportunities for two decades. The Guardian

'Miracle' jab which cures rare form of child blindness to be offered by the NHS, Simon Stevens to announce

'Miracle' jab which cures rare form of child blindness to be offered by the NHS, Simon Stevens to announce A “miracle” jab which cures a rare form of child blindness will now be offered by the NHS, Simon Stevens will announce today.

Previously no treatment has been available for infants born with inherited retinal dystrophies disorders, which cause poor vision and often result in complete blindness by childhood.

Mr Stevens, chief executive of the NHS, is expected to announce the revolutionary gene therapy treatment, which costs over £600,000 per patient, at the Health Innovation Expo conference in Manchester. The Daily Mail

See also:

• NHS to fund revolutionary treatment for blindness in children NHS England
• Gene therapy for rare eye disease set to be offered on NHS BBC News
• Blind children battling rare condition to have their sight restored on the NHS The Daily Mail
• One-off injection will save children from inherited blindness The Guardian

NHS could save thousands of pounds by cutting back on expensive air mattresses

NHS could save thousands of pounds by cutting back on expensive air mattresses High-tech mattresses used by the NHS are no better than cheaper alternatives at protecting against pressure sores, according to a study.

The devices, built into one in ten hospital beds, are allocated to patients at risk of pressure sores - mostly the elderly.

Whether they work compared to cheaper special foam mattresses had not been studied in depth until now. The Daily Mail

See also:

• Pressure Relieving Support Surfaces for Pressure Ulcer Prevention (PRESSURE 2): Clinical and Health Economic Results of a Randomised Controlled Trial eClinicalMedicine

Questions invited for health group's annual general meeting

Questions invited for health group's annual general meeting Anyone interested in the planning of the local health service can watch the live-stream of an annual general meeting being held by a public health body this week.

NHS Corby Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) and NHS Nene Clinical Commissioning Group are holding their annual general meeting on Thursday, September 5 at Kettering Conference Centre, with members of the public invited to attend in person or watch it online. Northamptonshire Telegraph

Joint letter to Members of Parliament on no deal Brexit

Joint letter to Members of Parliament on no deal Brexit As major decisions about Brexit are taken, we have written to MPs with the King’s Fund and Health Foundation to lay out the impact of leaving without a deal for health and social care. Nuffield Trust