Nhs

Sometimes I have a quiet time as a voluntary hospital visitor. But recently I’ve witnessed a lot of distress from people of all ages and types. The other week I saw an elderly Middle Eastern man bent over a bin in a ward corridor, crying almost uncontrollably. I asked him the problem and he stuttered out that he had been watching his daughter sleeping, and he believed she was going to die. I went off to find a nurse as I felt I didn’t know enough about his situation or hers to help. The nurse wouldn’t tell me anything due to patient confidentiality. I returned alone to the man and

We are used to political parties trying to claim credit for any positive development that happened during their time in office. The Labour Party’s current stance on healthcare is the exception to this rule. It represents the rare phenomenon of a party denigrating one of the best bits of its legacy. In the mid-2000s, the Labour government managed to inject a dose of competition into the once sclerotic provider-centric NHS. If shadow health secretary Andy Burnham is now positioning himself against the entry of private providers into the NHS, he is really positioning himself against one of his party’s biggest achievements. It is due to Labour’s legacy that patients now

For years, Secretaries of State for Health have studiously ignored one of the most corrosive regulations to the NHS: the European Working Time Directive. Although the EU is not supposed to have any remit over health, this ‘health and safety’ directive limits junior doctors’ hours to an average of 48 hours per week, with added ECJ judgements imposing compulsory immediate compensatory rest time should hours be breached – and ‘on-call’ time classed as work, even if the doctor is fast asleep. This rigid imposition is neither healthy, nor safe; with junior doctors complaining that it has led them to do illicit work to get sufficient hours of training in, unpaid,

If anyone thought Stephen Dorrell would take a break from talking about health after standing down as chairman of the House of Commons health select committee, they were quite wrong. The Spectator finds him in his Portcullis House office preparing to give a speech to the think tank Reform — his first since quitting the post — on how to make the health system better at delivering social care. He has no intention of leaving the NHS alone, even though he’s no longer leading the group of MPs whose job it is to scrutinise health policy. But, strangely, he stumbles when asked if he’s proud of the NHS. ‘Pride is a funny

Every so often when ministers are considering a policy, they send a little kite up to see how it’s received. Sometimes it gets hit by a lightning bolt of fury from a party’s target voters, and is never heard of again. Sometimes it flutters about and no-one plays a blind bit of notice. And sometimes the kite gets rapturous applause. There seems to be a mixed response to the kite flown today that people with anxiety and depression could be forced to have a talking therapy such as cognitive behavioural therapy or risk losing their benefits. On the one hand, it’s welcome that ministers want to help people with mental

In England, success in life is bound up with where you went to school. In Wales, where I come from, the standard of education can be so miserable that you’d do better to get expelled. I did. I’d just spent three days in ‘isolation’ in my south Wales comprehensive — banished to a cubicle with a CCTV camera — for misbehaviour. As I left the grounds, I lit a cigarette. A teacher accosted me. I got lippy and she smacked me across the face. I was expelled soon after. Thank God. If you want good schooling in Wales, you’d be best to go private. If you’re taken ill, make sure

The NHS has released the findings of its investigations into Jimmy Savile’s relationship with several hospitals and the accusations of abuse. Leeds General Infirmary has been the location of the most shocking incidents, which occurred from 1962 to 2009. Victims have reported abuses ranging from inappropriate comments to sexual assault and rape. Here are the five things you need to know about the latest Savile revelations: 1. Savile ‘interfered with the bodies of deceased patients’ Long-circulated rumours about Savile and necrophilia appear to have some credence, according to the Leeds report. It appears his unfettered access to the Leeds General Infirmary led to an interest in the mortuary which  ‘was

Sunlight is said to be the best of disinfectants. Jeremy Hunt has taken up this mantra with the launch of the NHS’s Accountability Hub today. As well as offering information about your nearest GP or hospital, the NHS Choices website is now full of patient safety indicators which, according to the Department of Health, offer an ‘unprecedented amount of patient safety information to allow patients, regulators and staff to see safety performance across a range of indicators.’ All sounds like a good idea, so I had a poke around to see how much information was available on two hospitals I’ve had the pleasure of visiting — one in London, one

It was Janet Tracey’s family who brought about a change in the law regarding Do Not Resuscitate notices on patient’s notes in hospital. Thanks to their efforts, hospitals will now have to consult patients and their families before instructing medics that they shouldn’t go out of their way to provide life-saving treatment. Mrs Tracey had made perfectly clear that she wanted to be in on her own case; didn’t matter – she got a DNR notice anyway. I’m not sure whether I was in quite this situation a couple of years ago when my mother was in St Mary’s Paddington after a fall. She succumbed to an infection which she