Comment archive – Page 384
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CommentStephen Eames on the need to make changes
Sunday morning and it looks as if it is going to be a hot day - a precursor to a long hot summer dominated by organising surge plans to combat pandemic flu, while digesting the impact of another central initiative on quality, innovation, improvement and productivity, otherwise known as “QIPP”.
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CommentPaul Corrigan on commissioning strategy plans
Nearly all primary care trust commissioning strategy plans describe a rationale for their intentions over the next five years. Tailored to the health and healthcare needs of their population, they describe future actions which intend to move activity out of secondary care, and cut emergency admissions and attendance at A&E.
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CommentMichael White on the future of healthcare funding
For a politician in his situation, care services minister Phil Hope was in a remarkably cheerful mood when I caught up with him to find out how well - or badly - his department’s latest green paper had been received.
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CommentJenny Rogers on tendering
The person on the telephone sounds very young. I am stifling incredulity at her request. “You mean you want me to tender for this?” I ask.
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CommentSurvey: How do you think the NHS is coping with swine flu?
Health Service Journal and Nursing Times would like to hear about the experience of swine flu by NHS staff so we can share with you, via our magazines and websites, how nurses and managers are feeling and what support they are getting.
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LeaderPatients don't care who provides GP services as long as they work
Why does the public have to endure antiquated GP services?
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Leader
The tripartite leadership must be debated
This week the Cabinet Office is finally unveiling its report on the progress the Department of Health has made since an excoriating “capability review” two years ago.
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CommentNoel Plumridge: the optimism bias uplift
The crowd from the finance department were relaxing in the Rat and Weasel musing on life’s three inevitables: death, taxes… and the private finance initiative.
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CommentMedia Watch: is Burnham the new Pants Man?
As swine flu takes increasing hold it will be interesting to see how the national papers’ coverage of the pandemic begins to diverge.
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CommentMichael White on swine flu and infectious attitudes
There comes a time when even a “keep calm” column has to acknowledge that Britain seems to be edging towards a swine flu pandemic. Alas, there is no antiviral to protect more vulnerable groups like politicians from exhibiting alarming symptoms.
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CommentClare Chapman: on being ready for the NHS constitution
How ready are we for the NHS constitution? Subject to the Health Bill being passed, all providers of NHS services will be under a legal duty to have regard to the new contract. Legal duties already in law will have to be fulfilled too and we will need to work ...
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CommentYour Humble Servant on private lessons
We are all still reeling from the shock news of Mark Britnell’s sudden departure for pastures more remunerative. Thankfully he has left us with a commissioning sector which no one else in the world can match… and oddly none has sought to do so.
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CommentKen Jarrold: Five ways to give feedback
Feedback is one of the most valuable gifts our colleagues can give us. To find someone who has the tact, courage and skill to tell you honestly how you are doing is a very rare thing indeed. In 36 years of full time work I had seven good appraisals.
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CommentThe social care green paper: What's in it for the NHS?
NHS managers could be forgiven for asking why they should be interested in the government’s long-awaited Green Paper on adult social care. The prospect of swine flu, shifting political priorities and impending fiscal gloom might seem enough to worry about.
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LeaderOur mission is clear: to help our readers
Last weekend the Mail on Sunday ran a full page article claiming an HSJ reporter (Sally Gainsbury) wrote a news story in the magazine as part of a Labour “sting” to undermine Conservative health policy.
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Leader
Pay freeze is warmer prospect than thousands of job losses
HSJ’s interviews with a panel of finance directors have begun to flush out where managers are planning to make savings as the financial noose tightens.
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CommentSimon Stevens: on lifestyles and living beyond 100
If all goes well, next month my wife’s grandma will turn 100. That is a birthday only around one in 5,000 of her peers will be around to celebrate. Not bad for a woman who, like millions of others, emigrated between the two world wars from eastern Europe to New ...
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CommentMichael White: on patient safety and savvy spending
I had an odd experience at the weekend. Reading the Commons health select committee’s depressing report on patient safety, I kept thinking of the more visible drama now being played out over public expenditure and pay.
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CommentMediawatch: swine flu... it could be you
We’ve all got guilty pleasures that are bad for our health and this week there is another one to add to the list.
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CommentAndy McKeon: saving £15bn-£20bn will be no summer holiday
This summer senior NHS managers have been set a problem they will still be studying for months ahead - how to save £15bn-£20bn over three years from 2011.