Acute Care – Page 459
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News
Labour MP slams workforce planning
Labour MP and health select committee member Dr Howard Stoate has criticised a 'boom and bust' culture in NHS workforce planning and argued against local planning.Speaking at a committee hearing yesterday, he said a lack of centralised workforce planning meant the NHS was 'chasing its tail'.
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News
Trusts prepare for hard sell to earn picky patients' custom
DoH guidelines have opened the door for hospitals to use commercial advertising techniques. Is this necessary for healthy competition or a green light for unseemly publicity battles? Kaye McIntosh hears some early pledges of fair play
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News
Pension guidance released
The Department of Health has produced a guide for staff leaving NHS employment but wishing to continue their membership of the NHS pension scheme.The guidance also sets out advice about employer responsibilities for pension provision where staff have to leave the scheme.Read the guide here
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HSJ Knowledge
Solid data bears comparison
Hospital discharge planning decisions need hard facts to back them up, as Mathew Mackenzie and Marion Scholes explain
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HSJ Knowledge
Cross the divide and rule
Chief executives have switched between primary care and acute trusts. Jenifer Taylor examines how the roles and the demands differ, looks at the reasons behind the moves and discusses with three top managers their plans
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Comment
Independent sector falls down on data
A level playing field is the holy grail of trust managers who see themselves as competing with the private sector for clinical work. Key to that is confidence that patients and their GPs will be able to make informed choices about where they should go for treatment.
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News
Doctors call for more allergy specialists
There is a need for more allergy specialists and better training for health professionals, a delegation of doctors from the medical royal colleges has told the Lords' science and technology committee.The committee is overseeing an ongoing investigation into allergy and allergic diseases.Find out more here
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News
Gerry Robinson and the NHS
Management guru Sir Gerry Robinson's televised stint at Rotherham foundation trust to reduce waiting lists might have worked better in a trust that has not already achieved so much to place it on a more business-like footing.
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News
New bursary scheme announced
The Department for Health has announced changes to the September 2007 NHS bursary scheme.Rent will become a deductible expense for all student nurses, midwives, allied health professionals and medical and dental students, when calculating their childcare allowances.The changes have been agreed with unions, and they include an increase in the ...
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News
Thinking long term on treatments
News that government action to tackle the effects of heart disease in the UK population through better care and statin drugs has to be welcomed. Yet it also leads to questions about why this strategy could not be adopted for other conditions which blight lives and cost the NHS (and ...
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News
DoH publishes diagnostic waiting times
The Department of Health published the diagnostic test waiting times data for the month ending November 2006.This data shows the NHS' progress in tackling the waiting times for 15 key diagnostic tests.Click here to see the data
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News
Thinking long term on treatments
News that government action to tackle the effects of heart disease in the UK population through better care and statin drugs has to be welcomed. Yet it also leads to questions about.why this strategy could not be adopted for other conditions which blight lives and cost the NHS (and the ...
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News
A&E doctors struggling to cope, says report
A report by the British Medical Association says NHS debt is taking its toll on accident and emergency departments in England.Despite efforts from staff to tackle A&E waiting times, a survey conducted by the BMA and the British Association for Emergency Medicine suggests departments are struggling to sustain the four-hour ...
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News
Report calls for more support for employing disabled people
Employers should be trained in the support available in employing a disabled person, according to the Public Accounts Committee.A report on the Department for Work and Pension's support for disabled people says more flexible employment advice should be given to disabled people, that current service provision is patchy and that ...
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News
Nursing code gets overhaul
The Nursing and Midwifery Council is reviewing its rulebook for UK nurses and midwives. The Code of Conduct is to be made clearer and updated to reflect today's healthcare needs.The draft code was agreed in December and the NMC will be holding a series of focus groups and seminars around ...
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News
NHS should treat gambling addiction
The British Medical Association has called for gambling treatment to be made available on the NHS.In recommendations to help healthcare professionals deal with the growing problem of gambling addiction, it calls for gambling operators to pay at least £10m a year to fund research, prevention and intervention programmes.From September new ...
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News
Guidelines aim to tackle medicine supply problems
The government and the pharmaceutical industry have joined forces to beat medicine supply problems in England.The Department of Health, the Association of British Pharmaceutical Industry and the British Generic Manufacturers Association have produced guidelines to ensure unavoidable shortages are handled more collaboratively in the future.Read the guidelines here
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News
Commission appoints new head of independent healthcare
The Healthcare Commission has appointed Jon Billings as head of independent healthcare.Mr Billing has been acting in the post since March 2006 and was previously in charge of the Commission's London and South East Region operations team.He takes the role as the commission moves to inspecting fewer independent healthcare sites ...
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Comment
Rotherham chief executive Brian James on why Gerry Robinson can't fix the NHS
'Disappointingly, Sir Gerry never seized the opportunity to explore and challenge consultants as to how they could be more efficient and productive, which is ultimately the key to eradicating waiting times. The opportunity was sacrificed for a much simpler story of consultants versus managers, with both sides presented as stereotypes.'
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Comment
A prescription for professionalism
What ideas like NHS independence lack is not the eye-catching headline or even the fine detail but the implementation and local connection