Health Service Journal
5 February 2009
View all stories from this issue.
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Asperger syndrome: unlock the full spectrum of care
Efforts under way in Dorset mean adults with Asperger syndrome no longer have to go without the support they need -
Audit finds Scottish NHS estates in disrepair
The NHS in Scotland should manage its £5bn assets - including land, buildings and equipment - more efficiently, auditors have warned. -
Centre of excellence needs clearer vision, King's Fund warns
The Department of Health's new centre of excellence risks being 'overloaded and ineffective' if it is not given a proper purpose, the King's Fund has said. -
Clinical Leaders Network: from strength to strength
Clinical Leaders Network director Raj Kumar talks about the initiative's progress so far and the hurdles that lie ahead -
Conservatives highlight NHS litigation cost increase
The government has admitted that NHS negligence premiums will nearly double to £713m in the next financial year. -
Council wins grant to investigate inequalities
A council has won a national grant to undertake a five-month inquiry into inequalities in primary care funding, following an HSJ exposé last year. -
Daphne Austin on priority politics
With its use of selective stories, partial facts and opinion from a restricted range of experts presenting only a narrow range of insights, the current dialogue on priority setting resembles propaganda more than it does debate. -
Dementia strategy published
Memory clinics will be set up in every town in England, doctors will get extra training to recognise the early signs of dementia and every hospital and care home will have a senior clinician with responsibility for dementia care, as part of a £150m five-year dementia strategy. -
Dementia strategy will pose workforce challenges
Managers have welcomed long awaited government plans to transform dementia services but want more details on how they will be staffed and assessed. -
DH drops 'elitist' Top 250 leadership scheme
Plans set out in the next stage review to invest in the top 250 NHS leaders have been scrapped amid charges of 'elitism'. -
DH launches children's health survey
The Department of Health has launched its biggest ever survey of children's health. -
Do your rounds to be a better NHS leader
Dr D J Brown, a clinical fellow in emergency medicine, offers tips on how to be a better health service manager -
Dr Anna Donald
HSJ has learned of the sad death of Dr Anna Donald. Dr Donald, who died in Sydney Australia on 1 February, was formerly a co-founder of the healthcare information provider Bazian and an HSJ columnist. -
Emma Dent on counting calories
Using the recent anniversary of my birth as an excuse, Mr D and I seized the chance to go for a nice meal surrounded by grown-ups, before the only restaurants we get to patronise are those full of buggies and helpings of organic carrot. -
Half of all patients aware they have choice
Almost half of all patients are aware they have choice. -
Health watchdog handover is on 'red risk'
Crucial staffing and financial decisions regarding the handover from the Healthcare Commission to the Care Quality Commission are still unresolved just two months before the new body takes over. -
How have today's snowstorms affected your organisation?
Write to dave.west@emap.com with your stories and pictures. -
HSJ Intelligence: health mapping
Welcome to the latest issue of Intelligence, the quarterly HSJ supplement dedicated to innovation, information and technology. -
Huge bill looms for patient choice information
The health service faces a bill of millions for reminding patients of their legal right to choose their own secondary care provider under the terms of the NHS constitution. -
Improving NHS dementia care
With the long awaited dementia strategy finally here, the race is on to overcome the stigma surrounding the condition and spread the word about available treatments. Emma Dent reports -
Jenny Rogers on being lonely at the top of the NHS
With the new US president having begun his administration, carrying so many of our hopes for change and improvement, it is easy to forget how lonely the role can be. -
King College foundation trust chief welcomes targets
Bureaucracy and targets are no greater in the NHS than in the private sector, King's College foundation trust's new chief executive Tim Smart has insisted. -
London acute trusts face shake-up as bosses hand in their notice
London's hospital trusts face a massive management shake-up after the departure of four chief executives.Two of the chief executives - Julian Nettel at Barts and the London trust and Tara Donnelly at West Middlesex University Hospital trust - have resigned amid concerns about the performance of their trusts, which have missed financial and patient access targets. There are also question marks over when or even whether their trusts will achieve foundation statu -
Measles cases rise to record high
Last year saw the highest number of measles cases in England and Wales since records began, the Health Protection Agency has revealed. -
Media Watch: prayer dispute
'Persecuted for praying', screamed the Daily Mail's front page on Monday. Caroline Petrie, a community nurse in North Somerset 'could be sacked' for offering to pray for a 79 year old widow she was treating. -
Mental health promotion: healthiness is all in the mind
Andrew McCullough argues public health messages need a makeover so people base their lifestyles on an understanding of wellbeing that ties mental and physical health together -
Michael White on NHS co-operation and competition
Following last week’s HSJ article on the NHS’s Co-operation and Competition Panel I have lifted a few stones. -
Mixed ward target worries
Huge uncertainty exists over whether trusts will be able to comply with health secretary Alan Johnson's new diktat on mixed sex accommodation. -
MPs hear Richards review skirted major top-up areas
The government’s decision to allow co-payments for private treatments assumed it is best to make expensive drugs ‘as freely available as possible’, MPs have been told. -
Neil Goodwin on managing ambition in the NHS
NHS managers need to be aware of the benefits and dangers of personal ambition -
New alcohol guidelines aim to protect young people
Guidelines drawn up by the Scottish government and drinks firms body the Alcohol Industry Partnership aim to promote responsible drinking and ensure young people are not targeted. -
NHS career coaching: take control
Feeling downtrodden after a bruising divorce and unappreciated at work, one manager turned to coach Dorothy Larios to regain control of her life -
NHS has a role in weathering the recession
As the country's biggest employer and a tenth of the economy, the NHS has an major role to play in helping us all weather the recession. -
NHS links to pharmaceutical industry raise suspicions, RCP warns
The medical profession needs to distance itself from the pharmaceutical industry to restore public confidence in the NHS, doctors have warned. -
NHS managers call for clinical training overhaul
Managers and clinicians are calling for clinical training programmes to give doctors a better understanding of finance and resource management in the NHS. -
NHS managers not reaping benefits of Agenda for Change
Managers are still not reaping the benefits promised by Agenda for Change four years after it was introduced, according to the National Audit Office. -
NHS offers private providers shelter in rough economic seas
Until recently private providers could afford to be choosy about what NHS work they took on. Now, as the economy shrinks, the health service will become a vital source of income. Alison Moore reports -
NHS PROMs results ready by November
Hospitals will be publicly rated by patients' reports of their care before the end of the year. -
NICE lacks GP input says NHS Alliance
The NHS Alliance has given muted approval to Department of Health proposals to change the quality and outcomes framework GP bonus scheme. -
Non-urgent work called off as snow keeps staff at home
Hospitals across the country cancelled outpatient appointments and non-urgent surgery as they coped with staff absences and increased emergency admissions brought on by heavy snow. -
PCTs need cash and clout to deliver patient choice
The government is getting tough over choice. While the other legs of the next stage review - quality and safety - have clear strategies behind them and a sense of momentum, choice has failed to take hold. -
Recession puts foundation trust plans at risk
The recession is being cited as a cause for further delays in trusts gaining foundation status. -
Rose Gibb faces agonising wait for court's judgement
Rose Gibb faces an agonising wait to hear if she has won her legal battle with former employer Maidstone and Tunbridge Wells trust.At the end of four days of complex proceedings, Mr Justice Treacy said he wanted to reserve judgement on the breach of contract case. -
Rose Gibb: 'I was hounded, victimised, demonised'
Rose Gibb accused health secretary Alan Johnson of 'hounding' her after the Healthcare Commission published its critical report. -
Rose Gibb's 'irrational' pay-off went unchecked
NHS South East Coast and the Department of Health were aware a pay-off was under discussion with Maidstone and Tunbridge Wells trust chief executive Rose Gibb - but they failed to intervene to stop it from being signed, a court heard last week. -
Row brews as DH rejects blood clots measure
Healthcare Commission chair Sir Ian Kennedy has written to health secretary Alan Johnson to protest after the Department of Health rejected proposals aimed at reducing deadly blood clots. -
Snow hits non-urgent hospital services
Hospitals across the country cancelled non-urgent surgery as they coped with staff absences and increased emergency admissions brought on by heavy snow. -
Sophia Christie on healthcare's false economy
Just in case we thought Keynesian economics might protect us from the credit crunch, Nick Timmins of the Financial Times used his keynote presentation at an anniversary event for world class commissioning to demonstrate that we will be highly unlikely to enjoy growth reaching 3 per cent by 2011. -
The homeless and health
Initiatives to wrestle with the health consequences of homelessness are deprived of a coherent national strategy, say campaigners. Mark Gould hears the growing calls for the NHS to take the lead -
Trust board steps down to make way for FT takeover
The chair and entire non-executive team of a trust have stood down to make way for a takeover by a foundation trust.The Bedfordshire and Luton Mental Health and Social Care Partnership trust board took the decision after agreeing there was no prospect of achieving foundation trust status. -
Trust prepares for mental health training trial
A Yorkshire trust has been tasked with trying out a training package that could transform mental healthcare -
Trusts 'could opt out of working time directive'
The Department of Health has formally announced it wants trusts to be able to opt out of the European working time directive on behalf of junior doctors. -
Views sought on improving access to dentistry
The team leading an independent probe into variations in access to NHS dentistry is calling for people to come forward with 'thoughts and questions' about the issue. -
West Middlesex trust names Tara Donnelly's replacement
West Middlesex University Hospital trust has appointed an interim chief executive following the resignation of Tara Donnelly.Dame Jacqueline Docherty will join the trust on 23 February from King's College Hospital, where she was deputy chief executive and director of operations. -
What more can the NHS outsource?
The Catholic Church outsources the Mass - this is the raw economics of supply and demand in action. -
Why NICE values some patients' lives more
Mike Richards’ review of what to do about top-ups seems to reaffirm the line that the NHS should not subsidise private consumption of healthcare.
