Emergency Budget - how should it affect the NHS?

[Gordonb]

Annab I would agree with you. I know of one very large teaching hospital which employs 13+ electricians who spend most of their time wandering the corridors and hiding in the subterranean passages. Meanwhile whenever there was a large job to be done they were nowhere to be seen and outside contractors had to be brought at additional costs to do the work. I put this down to bad management of resources. If this were a smaller localised hospital then it would never have been allowed to build up to this level over the years

[Daven]

And what do you think this present government will do ?

 

This government will do exactly what it has done since getting into power - blame the mess on the last lot. They will slowly but surely cut back services and before anyone realises what is happening - they will make it impossible to get the level of care we have become accustomed to and the only way to maintain it will be to pay. For those of us who don't have a spare few thousand tucked away, this means less choice and having to be grateful for anything that we can get.

There will be a 2 tier health care system like in the USA - one for those who have the ability to pay and one for those who don't. Most of us, including me, will fall into the latter category.

[Tradescanthia]

This government will do exactly what it has done since getting into power - blame the mess on the last lot. They will slowly but surely cut back services and before anyone realises what is happening - they will make it impossible to get the level of care we have become accustomed to and the only way to maintain it will be to pay. For those of us who don't have a spare few thousand tucked away, this means less choice and having to be grateful for anything that we can get.

There will be a 2 tier health care system like in the USA - one for those who have the ability to pay and one for those who don't. Most of us, including me, will fall into the latter category.

 

Dont worry Daven, Cleggy the Con/Dem/Not sure will see us all right, the vultures in the private healthcare industry are already gathering. I am over 60 so I may get the same healthcare as before, but Lord help you younger guys earning decent incomes.

[Blade73]

I'm a labour supporter ok they ****ed up, but they brought us up to date, from I can remember, I've never known schools or hospitals having as much work done to em, I've no kids or been in hospital in the last 20 years. But we were left we with a poor reprensative on the school front I remember going to school and half the building was falling down the hill and a smashed window in our tutorial class, only reason it got done was Ken Barker doing a trip looking at the poor!

 

f u guess the secondary school I'm on about 10 credit points to u!

[hard2miss]

Health care:

 

I think they should stop treatment that can be deamed as for vanities sake.

 

No more C sections unless its medicaly nessersary if they do them for whingers.

 

sort out waiting times though to see doctors, if you get treatment fast enough it costs less in the long term treatment.

 

Step up local recruitment more so that people on local estates gain direct access to jobs and training, we moan about jobs going to foreign workers and moan about beople living on benifits a few mile away from hospitals. Stop paying managment more and get more people on the grounds cleaning and portering/reasuring/ generaly making a better possitive experiance. Whats lost is the feeling that the local Doc had time for you and whats worse still we have old folk even totaly ignored for hours on end waiting about and overlooked in hospitals.

 

We have lost all sence of community in this country and its something that has also been lost from health care. People now feel like out siders in their own nieghbourhood and then like cattle in medical care.

 

Money spent in local recruitment and training would pay dividends in bringing places out of poverty and bring back pride and some prosperity as well as giving us cleaner hospitals and more possitive experiance of local healthcare.

[Ms Macbeth]

I think the clinical side of the NHS shouldn't be cut - I certainly hope its not. Ditto the cleaning, maintenance, porterage etc. Administration is needed to ensure records are kept up to date and accurate.

 

However, so much of the NHS nowadays is about targets - and this has actually led to poorer services being delivered in some areas. So much emphasis is put on meeting government targets, that patient care can be overlooked. We, the public know, when we are getting a good service - and even with targets some hospitals are far better than others, likewise GP practices. The RCN wanted the number of targets reduced years ago: http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/health-news/nhs-targets-are-crazy-nurses-warn-602765.html

 

Imagine all the management and staff required just to collect data and produce figures - just to show if they are meeting targets.

 

Perhaps introducing charges for abuse of A&E, and fines for missing appointments could also be introduced - that would either bring money in or cut wasted clinical time.

[Daven]

A lot of the abuse of A&E is due to a poor service in Primary Care - i.e., folk can't get an appointment at their GP surgery for 4 days and so they go to their local A&E which, in turn, means that those who are acutely unwell have to wait longer.

Extend the surgery hours of GPs, make them more accessible to folk who work and open at weekends too. This would free the hospitals to care for the acutely ill and ensure that GPs earn the high salaries that they receive (£53 - 80k which is more than some hospital Consultants are paid).

Practice nurses need to be more accessible too - why can't some clinics be run in evenings and at weekends when many patients would find it more convenient to attend ?

Clearly, the surgeries and clinics are not run for the convenience of the patients.

[Ms Macbeth]

A lot of the abuse of A&E is due to a poor service in Primary Care - i.e., folk can't get an appointment at their GP surgery for 4 days and so they go to heir local A&E which, in turn, means that those who are acutely unwell have to wait longer.

Extend the surgery hours of GPs, make them more accessible to folk who work and open at weekends too. This would free the hospitals to care for the acutely ill and ensure that GPs earn the high salaries that they receive (£53 - 80k which is more than some hospital Consultants are paid).

Practice nurses need to be more accessible too - why can't some clinics be run in evenings and at weekends when many patients would find it more convenient to attend ?

Clearly, the surgeries and clinics are not run for the convenience of the patients.

 

We must be very lucky where we live - we have a same day service - by either turning up when the doors open or ringing, and a future appointments service. Saturday morning appointments are available too. Our local surgery is really accessible, yet for a while they had a notice showing how many appointments had been missed for the month. It was a fair number. I do agree however that there should be some evening appointments at least a couple of times a week. Also GPs have recently seen huge increases in their salaries, yet rarely do out of hours visits now, its mainly covered by locum services - and at what cost?

 

By abuse of A&E, I meant such as those who end up injured because they have drunk too much, or have been fighting, then abuse the staff instead of being thankful they are being treated. Perhaps also people who have very minor ailments that could be treated by visiting a pharmacist, or just by taking a painkiller.

[espadrille]

We must be very lucky where we live - we have a same day service - by either turning up when the doors open or ringing, and a future appointments service. Saturday morning appointments are available too. Our local surgery is really accessible, yet for a while they had a notice showing how many appointments had been missed for the month. It was a fair number. I do agree however that there should be some evening appointments at least a couple of times a week. Also GPs have recently seen huge increases in their salaries, yet rarely do out of hours visits now, its mainly covered by locum services - and at what cost?

 

By abuse of A&E, I meant such as those who end up injured because they have drunk too much, or have been fighting, then abuse the staff instead of being thankful they are being treated. Perhaps also people who have very minor ailments that could be treated by visiting a pharmacist, or just by taking a painkiller.

 

yes. A very good post