Comment archive – Page 387
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CommentMedia Watch: Mid Staffs in the papers
It hasn’t been a good week for NHS PR, with the report on failings at Mid Staffordshire Foundation Trust filling tabloids and broadsheets alike on Thursday and Friday, and the weekend papers coming back for a second helping.
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CommentMichael White on the Mid Staffs inquiry
An anecdote and a think tank boffin came to mind as I ploughed through the undimmed horrors of Robert Francis QC’s report on the disaster at Mid Staffordshire Foundation Trust.
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CommentJenny Rogers on NHS staff engagement
Every half decade or so, a new wonder idea comes along in management - for instance, learning organisations, business process re-engineering, total quality management, or - aeons ago - management by objectives.
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CommentMark Britnell on the future of Agenda for Change
Agenda for Change does not need to be scrapped and renegotiated - just applied properly
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CommentMark Goldman on inspiring people
“We must reject the idea - well intentioned but dead wrong - that the primary path to greatness in the social sectors is to become ‘more like a business’.
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LeaderDream of taking on ailing trusts founders on rocks of Good Hope
With just five weeks to go before non-foundation trusts have to outline their plans for joining the elite, there are severe doubts about the government’s aspiration for foundation trusts to rescue weaker hospitals.
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CommentSecrets, buckets and a princely opinion
After the very public spat between Andy Burnham, Andrew Lansley and Norman Lamb over the future of social care funding, and the will-they-won’t-they running commentary on which of them would attend a conference on the issue last Friday, the press were shut out of the event itself.
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CommentMichael White: NHS reorganisation row
By chance I stumbled on an NHS row which intrigues me. It is the sight of Labour ministers and their Tory shadows and wannabe successors joining forces to denounce disgraceful “scaremongering” about a hospital reorganisation.
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LeaderFoundation independence is on a knife edge
Foundation trusts are undermining their autonomy through poor governance and accountability.
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CommentKen Jarrold on preparing to vote in the general election
The general election is now within touching distance. The campaign is well underway. It is time to prepare and three points may help to do this.
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CommentMichael White: the personal care row
Seatbelts on please, crash helmets too. The pre-election row over personal care for the elderly shows alarming signs of blundering on to polling day.
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CommentAlan Maynard: could the Tories give PCTs bite?
The ‘toothless bulldogs’ of the NHS might hope for more control over purchasing under the Conservatives
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CommentAndrew Jones on the politics of wellbeing
Election season is upon us and the aspiring communicator can only watch in awe as the main protagonists wheel out their proven strategists and presenters.
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LeaderBurying the NHS mortality row will clear the way for quality push
The Department of Health is trying to get a grip on the toxic issue of hospital standardised mortality ratios.
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LeaderRoyal Surrey has some explaining to do
HSJ’s revelation that Royal Surrey County Hospital was the foundation trust selling millions of pounds of drugs on the export market requires some answers from its board.
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CommentMedia Watch: social care funding fight
A toe-to-toe row between health secretary Andy Burnham and his Tory counterpart Andrew Lansley in the Commons injected some colour into the papers last week.
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CommentCally Bann: funding gap
Call me old fashioned, but if you ask me, the difference between 240 and 260 is 20. Which is what I call a gap.
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CommentSheila Williams on leading staff through tough times
Leaders need to remember their core purpose - that of engaging the hearts and minds of their people.
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CommentMichael White: NHS spending pledges
Which is the more alarming spectacle: David Cameron and George Osborne promising real term cuts in public expenditure (but not “swingeing” ones) in the coming Parliament? Or Gordon Brown behaving as if he can carry on making new spending pledges for the NHS?
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LeaderSenior NHS ranks have proved their value, how can they maintain it?
HSJ this week reveals that NHS trusts with the greatest increases in the number of managers are often those that are providing the best quality services.