All articles by Crispin Dowler – Page 12
-
News
Fair playing field review targets commissioner behaviour
Monitor this week published a suite of recommendations aimed at encouraging commissioners to allow providers to compete more to supply NHS care. The healthcare sector regulator concluded opportunities to compete were being “unduly limited” by existing commissioning practices.
-
News
Some commissioning groups face deficits in first year, officials admit
Some clinical commissioning groups are forecasting they will record deficits in their first year of operation, just days before the new groups take control of NHS budgets, the NHS Commissioning Board has confirmed.
-
News
OFT extends its remit over NHS mergers
Healthcare sector regulator Monitor has confirmed the Office of Fair Trading will in future have responsibility for assessing any merger involving an NHS foundation trust.
-
News
Morecambe Bay reveals former chief’s compromise agreement
WORKFORCE: The foundation trust today released details of the ‘compromise agreement’ it reached with former chief executive Tony Halsall, who stepped down last February amidst a care quality scandal.
-
News
DH on course for biggest underspend this parliament
The Department of Health is this year on course for its biggest annual underspend in the current parliament – with none of the unused budget due to be carried over for future use, today’s Budget revealed.
-
News
Commissioning board and Monitor: competition 'not about ideology'
Healthcare sector regulator Monitor and the NHS Commissioning Board this week issued a joint statement of intent on how competition would work in the reformed health service, amid continuing political controversy about the government’s NHS competition regulations.
-
News
MPs call for abolition of 'inflexible' NHS spending restraints
An influential committee of MPs has called for “unnecessarily inflexible” restrictions on NHS spending to be “abolished”, to allow providers to invest their accumulated reserves in reforming services.
-
News
Third of foundation trusts failed A&E waiting targets in Q3
Monitor has reported a sharp decline in performance of foundation trust accident and emergency departments, with over a third of the sector missing A&E waiting targets in the last three months of 2012.
-
Comment
Failure regime can't escape politics
The questions are economic, but the answers are political
-
News
NHS hospitals could be paid extra under 'cherry picking' rules
Commissioners may need to increase the prices they pay to NHS hospitals left with more complex workloads after other providers have “cherry picked” the easier patients, new Department of Health guidance shows.
-
News
Regulator moves to put Mid Staffs in administration
Healthcare sector regulator Monitor has begun the process of putting Mid Staffordshire Foundation Trust into administration.
-
News
Confed appoints GP as new policy chief
The NHS Confederation has appointed a former chair of the National Association of Primary Care and a former NHS Direct chief executive to senior executive positions, it announced today.
-
HSJ Local
Bolton FT chief steps aside amid probe of mortality coding
PERFORMANCE: The acting chief executive of Bolton Foundation Trust has agreed to “step aside” while a probe is conducted into possible “discrepancies” in the way the trust has coded mortality information.
-
News
CCGs warn they risk being 'saddled with inherited debt'
Clinical commissioning groups have warned they are at risk of being “saddled with an inherited debt” when they take on their new powers, as a result of an onslaught of retrospective claims for NHS continuing healthcare funding.
-
News
Analysed: The continuing care claims deluge
PCTs face a £600m bill for backdated claims for care funding, and this is causing anxiety for clinical commissioning groups too
-
Comment
Competition authorities take their positions
The CCP and OFT could have a major influence on NHS mergers
-
News
Exclusive: 'Gagging' agreements in numbers
Figures obtained by Health Service Journal - presented below - paint a picture of the extent of use of compromise agreeements and confidentiality clauses - or gagging orders - in the NHS.
-
News
Analysis: Confidentiality deals a perennial controversy in the NHS
Confidentiality clauses in severance settlements are not a new source of controversy in the NHS.
-
News
Compromise agreements 'should not silence safety concerns'
The vast majority of compromise agreements in the NHS are not the result of whistleblowing disputes, while confidentiality clauses cannot be used to directly prevent patient safety concerns being raised, HSJ has been told.