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UK medics call US abortion ban 'catastrophic blow'

The UK response to the removal of the constitutional right to abortion in the US has been one of anger, sadness, and disbelief.

The US Supreme Court has voted to overturn the 1973 case of Roe vs Wade, so in effect revoking the constitutional right to abortion that American women have had since the landmark decision. It means the 50 individual US states will be able to set their own abortion laws. Half are expected to ban abortions, some already have, and already clinics across the US have been closing down.

The ruling has been widely condemned by the UK’s healthcare organisations, including the British Medical Association and the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists.

The BMA called it "deeply worrying for the future of women’s reproductive health". Dr Zoe Greaves, chair of the BMA’s medical ethics committee said: "Banning or severely restricting abortion prevents only the safe termination of pregnancy, it doesn’t prevent abortions. If women are denied necessary and appropriate care, they will be forced to travel out of their home state to access services, something which is also being suggested will be made illegal. It could also drive abortion services underground and lead to an increase in self-administered abortions, placing the most vulnerable of women at greatest risk of harm. Restricting abortion will harm ‘rural, minority and poor patients’ the most, according to leading health organisations in the US."

Dr Helen Munro, vice-chair of the Faculty of Sexual and Reproductive Healthcare (FSRH) said: "Criminalising abortion and hampering access to care only serves to increase the number of unsafe abortions, putting women’s lives at risk.

"All women should be able to receive prompt access to abortion services, which should include good pregnancy decision-making support and access to post-abortion contraception by trained healthcare professionals if they choose."

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Source: Medscape, 27 June 2022

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USA: OBGYNs reacting to Roe Vs Wade fear for patient safety and health

Reproductive health doctors are reacting to the Supreme Court's decision to overturn Roe vs Wade, the 1973 case that allowed people to seek abortions with limited government intervention.

On Friday, Justice Samuel Alito delivered his opinion on the case Dobbs vs Jackson Women's Health, saying he favoured the state of Mississippi in the case. Now, Roe vs Wade, which allowed abortion until about 24 weeks of pregnancy, is overruled, and individual states have the power to decide their residents' abortion rights.

OBGYNs who provide abortion care and family-planning services told Insider they worry for their patients' health and safety, and the future of all reproductive healthcare including miscarriages, fertility treatments, and birth control.

"This decision made by the SCOTUS is one that completely obliterates freedom from reproductive justice and women's health directly," Dr. Jessica Shepherd, a Texas-based gynecologist and Chief Medical Officer at Verywell Health, told Insider.

Dr. Stephanie Ros, a Florida-based OBGYN, says she fears most for working-class abortion seekers.

"I'm not worried about my wealthy patients – they will have the means to go 'visit an aunt' in Europe or elsewhere, and access abortion care if they so desire. I'm terrified for my middle class and poor patients, who don't have the means to pick up and travel on a moment's notice, and who often don't have access to medical care to even discover they're pregnant until later than their wealthy counterparts." 

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Source: Insider, 24 June 2022

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Rubella warning to pregnant women amid MMR jab decline

Diminishing rates of measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) jabs have prompted a Royal College warning over the risks to pregnant women, as the NHS raises concerns over London “lagging” behind the national uptake.

The Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health’s immunisations lead, Dr Helen Bradford, said the falling uptake of the MMR vaccine could present a serious risk to pregnant women and their unborn children.

The warning comes as London health authorities are planning a major summer drive to improve uptake in the capital, The Independent has learned.

Documents seen by The Independent setting out NHS plans for a summer MMR campaign put the focus on social media, including approaching “influencers” to spread messages. The plans also rely on free publicity, with proposals to approach broadcast media.

Risks to increasing uptake, according to the document, included anti-vaxx sentiment towards MMR, apathy towards the vaccine, controversy meaning influencers won’t work with the NHS, and a lack of internal data.

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Source: The Independent, 27 June 2022

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NHS patients will spend last years in pain, warns top doctor

Suffering is “the new norm” in the NHS and people can expect to spend their last few years in pain, the outgoing chairman of the British Medical Association said.

Chaand Nagpaul, who steps down this week, said the NHS was in a “perilous state”. He also wants people to have sympathy for the “plight” of junior doctors, who have said they will prepare for a ballot on strikes over pay.

There are 6.5 million people on NHS waiting lists, many of whom have been waiting a year or more. Nagpaul, who has been a GP for 33 years, said: “I have not come across this scale of suffering, of unmet need. And what we’re going to be seeing is people spending the last years of their lives, literally in pain, unable . . . to have a hip operation. That will be the final years of their lives.”

He said there was a “whole, larger population of patients just literally not featuring in the statistics” waiting for outpatient treatment, mental health care and diabetes checks.

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Source: The Times, 27 June 2022

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UK doctors demand pay rise of up to 30% over five years

Doctors have thrown down the gauntlet to the government by calling for a pay rise of up to 30% over the next five years, in a move that increases the chances of strike action.

Delegates at the British Medical Association’s (BMA) annual conference voted to press ministers to agree to the increase to make up for real-terms cuts to their salaries over the last 14 years.

Frontline doctors said years of pay freezes and annual salary uplifts of 1% had caused the real value of their take-home pay to fall by almost a third since 2008. They now want “full pay restoration” to return the value of their pay to 2008 levels, and have instructed the BMA to pursue that goal with a government that has made clear it will not hand public sector workers sizeable salary increases in case it fuels already rampant inflation.

The motion noted “with horror that all doctors’ pay has fallen against RPI [the retail prices index] since 2008 to the tune of up to 30%”. It said the BMA’s leadership should “achieve pay restoration to 2008 for its members within the next five years” and report back annually on progress.

Proposing the motion, Dr Emma Runswick, a member of the BMA’s ruling council, said: “We should not wait for things to get worse. All of us deserve comfort and pleasure in our lives. Pay restoration is the right, just and moral thing to do. But it is a significant demand and it won’t be easy to win. Every part of the BMA needs to plan for how to achieve this.”

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Source: The Guardian, 27 June 2022

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Former prime minister calls contaminated blood scandal 'incredibly bad luck'

Former prime minister Sir John Major has described the contaminated blood scandal as "incredibly bad luck", drawing gasps from families watching him give evidence under oath to the public inquiry into the disaster.

Up to 30,000 people contracted HIV and hepatitis C in the 1970s and 80s after being given blood treatments or transfusions on the NHS. Thousands have since died.

Sir John later apologised for his choice of language.

He said: "I obviously caused offence inadvertently this morning when I referred to the fact that it was awful that people had been fed infected blood and I referred to it as sheer bad luck.

"I can only say to people it wasn't intended to be offensive. I was seeking to express the fact that I was concerned about what happened.

"It was intended simply to say that it was a random matter and I perhaps expressed it injudiciously."

The UK-wide inquiry was launched after years of campaigning by victims, who claim the risks were never explained and that the scandal was covered up.

Campaigners say those infected decades ago are now dying at the rate of one every four days as a result.

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Source: BBC News, 27 June 2022

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Possible link between blood clots and Covid symptoms investigated

A possible link between blood clots and ongoing symptoms of Covid is under scrutiny by researchers in the UK.

While Covid can cause a period of acute illness, it can also lead to longer-term problems. Research has suggested fewer than a third of patients who have ongoing Covid symptoms after being hospitalised with the disease feel fully recovered a year later.

Now researchers are due to begin a number of trials to explore whether blood thinners may help those who have had the disease.

Prof Ami Banerjee, of University College London, who is leading a study called Stimulate-ICP, said it was known that a Covid infection increases the risk of blood clots, and that people who have had the disease have a greater risk of related conditions including stroke, heart attacks and deep vein thrombosis.

In addition, Banerjee said research from scientists in South Africa had suggested that people with long Covid have microclots in their blood, while studies in the UK suggested almost a third of long Covid patients have clotting abnormalities.

But he said it was not clear if the findings were generalisable, and while there had been calls on social media for anticoagulants to be made available on the basis of such findings, further research was needed, not least as blood thinners can lead to an increased risk of bleeds.

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Source: The Guardian, 27 June 2022

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'We will be in uncharted territory:' 4 leaders on the potential implications of Roe vs Wade reversal

The effects of the Supreme Court's proposed overrule of Roe vs Wade will touch health systems nationwide — leading some clinicians to urge industry leaders to start preparing for potential fallout prior to the decision. 

"Health systems that view abortion exclusively as a political or partisan issue, perhaps one they'd like to avoid, will soon bear witness to the reality that abortion care, or lack thereof, is a healthcare and health equity issue," Lisa Harris, MD, PhD, wrote in a 11 May for The New England Journal of Medicine. "Avoiding the issue will not be possible, short of abandoning care and equity missions altogether. Thoughtful preparation is needed now."

Four leaders at three systems share there insights.

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Source: Becker's Hospital Review, 23 June 2022

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NHS patients to be offered chance to travel for surgery

NHS patients in England who have been waiting more than two years for surgery are being offered hospital treatment in alternative parts of the country.

More than 6,000 long-term waiting-list patients are being offered travel and accommodation costs where appropriate to help the NHS through the backlog.

Health officials want to ensure nobody is waiting more than two years by the end of July.

Three patients waiting for surgery in Derby have already received treatment in the Northumbria health region, with another two patients booked in, NHS England said.

And in south-west London, 17 orthopaedic patients from the South West of England are being treated, with another 11 patients set to follow in the coming weeks.

Health and Social Care Secretary Sajid Javid said the number of two-year waits had already reduced by two-thirds since January.

"Innovations like this are helping to tackle waiting lists and speed up access to treatment, backed by record investment," he said.

But British Medical Association leader Dr Chaand Nagpaul is warning that attempts to address what he called a "once in a generation backlog of unimaginable proportions" would be undermined by a lack of staff and beds.

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Source: BBC News, 27 June 2022

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UK to strengthen regulation of medical devices to protect patients

New plans to strengthen the regulation of medical devices to improve patient safety and encourage innovation have been published.

Following the UK’s exit from the European Union (EU), the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) has a unique opportunity to improve how medical devices and in vitro diagnostic medical devices (IVDs) are regulated in the UK.

The package of reforms will apply to medical devices such as hearing aids, x-ray machines and insulin pumps; new technologies such as smartphone apps and Artificial Intelligence (AI); as well as certain cosmetic products like dermal fillers.

The new measures include:

  • Strengthening the MHRA’s powers to act to keep patients safe. Giving the public and patients greater assurance on both the performance and safety of the highest-risk medical devices, such as those which need to be implanted.
  • Increasing the scope and extent of regulation to respond to public need. Enhancing systems that are already in place to better protect users of medical devices and certain cosmetic products, and providing greater assurance of their performance and safety.
  • Addressing health disparities and mitigating identified inequities throughout medical devices development and use. Mitigating against inequities in medical devices, ensuring they function as intended for diverse populations. The government has launched a review into the potential equity issues in the design and use of medical devices to tackle health inequalities and will update in due course.
  • Making the UK a focus for innovation, and the best place to develop and introduce innovative medical devices. Ensuring the new regulatory framework encourages responsible innovation so that patients in the UK are better able to access the most advanced medical devices to meet their needs.
  • Setting world-leading standards and building the new UKCA mark. Transforming a new stamp of certification, replacing the CE mark, into a trusted brand that signifies global safety, health and environment protection standards have been met for medical device products. This will in turn boost the MHRA’s global reputation and growing partnerships with other regulators.

Health and Social Care Secretary Sajid Javid said: "Now we have left the EU, these new changes will allow innovation to thrive and ensure UK patients are among the first to benefit from technological breakthroughs."

"We are now able to introduce some of the most robust safety measures in the world for medical devices to ensure patients are protected."

Read press release

Source: Gov.UK, 26 June 2022

 

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Long delays for surgery ‘will trigger public health crisis’

Surgery waiting lists will triple by 2030, triggering a “population health crisis”, unless there is a huge increase in NHS capacity, according to new research.

Experts from Birmingham University have said efforts to reduce hospital backlogs are not enough and that it is “impossible” for the existing frontline workers to tackle increasing waiting lists.

The most in-depth analysis of the challenge facing hospital waiting lists in England has revealed 4.3 million people need invasive surgery or procedures such as endoscopy, the largest number since 2007.

Of these, an estimated 3.3 million are on a “hidden waiting list”, likely to need treatment but yet to be identified by the NHS due to the impact of the pandemic.

More than 2.3 million people, 53% of the waiting list, are of working age, meaning their delayed diagnoses and treatments could have an impact on the economy.

Without a substantial increase in NHS capacity, the team behind the work say the total figure for those waiting for surgery in England could rise to 14.6 million by 2030.

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Source: The Times, 26 June 2022

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Patients' champion 'won't speak to patients'

Patients will not be able to directly contact Scotland’s new Patient Safety Commissioner under the role’s proposed remit, according to the Sunday Post.

Officials drawing up the job description for the position are proposing patients with concerns and complaints should go through their local health boards instead of dealing directly with the commissioner.

Last week, Henrietta Hughes was named as the government’s preferred candidate for the role of Patient Safety Commissioner in England. In that role, Hughes will be able to be directly contacted by the public.

Despite being the first UK country to announce the intention to appoint a commissioner two years ago the role in Scotland is not yet filled.

The decision not to allow patients to directly contact the commissioner in Scotland has been criticised by Baroness Julia Cumberlege, author of the report, First Do No Harm.

She said: “Of course, patients must be able to communicate directly with the commissioner and their office. In our review we said the healthcare system is not good enough at spotting trends in practice and outcomes that give rise to safety concerns. Listening to patients is pivotal to that.

“This is why one of our principal recommendations was the appointment of an independent Patient Safety Commissioner, a person of standing who sits outside the healthcare system, accountable to parliament through the Health and Social Care Select Committee."

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Source: The Sunday Post, 26 June 2022

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NHS crisis caused by Tory underfunding not Covid, say doctors

Senior doctors have drawn up a major dossier refuting Sajid Javid’s claim that the pressures on the NHS were created by the Covid pandemic, amid continued warnings over patient safety, scarce beds and staff morale.

The health secretary has repeatedly suggested that the problems around record waiting lists and ambulance waiting times have been prompted by the pandemic. Last week in parliament, he accused shadow health secretary Wes Streeting of having his “head under a rock for two years” for not seeing that the pressures stemmed from Covid.

However, in a major review of evidence shared with the Observer, doctors pointed to issues around funding, bed capacity, staffing and recruitment that pre-dated the arrival of Covid. The dossier, drawn up by the British Medical Association as it gathers for its annual conference this week, finds that the UK’s health services were ill-prepared for the pandemic as a result of “historical underfunding and under-resourcing in the decade preceding the virus”.

Denise Langhor, an emergency medicine consultant in the north-west of England, said that the pandemic had “laid bare” the health service’s problems, but did not create them. “Those problems and those holes already existed,” she said. “It is entirely disingenuous of this government to claim the waiting lists and the difficulties people are experiencing with NHS care at the moment are due to Covid. They have been building for a decade.

“Every day, I have patients that I wish I could have treated sooner. It’s an awful thing as a doctor to be trying to look after patients on a corridor, and knowing they are not getting the standard of care that you want to give them.

“Frequently it feels like we’re operating by choosing the least worst option rather than the best option.”

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Source: The Guardian, 26 June 2022

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Lack of diagnostic testing for bacterial infections is ‘alarming’, warns AMR review chair

The UK needs to do more to use diagnostic testing in the fight against antimicrobial resistance (AMR), the chair of a government-commissioned review on AMR told MPs.

Lord O’Neill, an economist and former treasury minister, warned in the review’s final report in 2016 that a continued rise in AMR would lead to 10 million people dying each year by 2050 and made ten recommendations, including the need for rapid diagnostics to reduce unnecessary use of antimicrobials.

Speaking to a Commons Science and Technology Committee evidence session on 22 June 2022, Lord O’Neill said that while he was pleased with progress on some of the recommendations published in his review in 2016, especially in the reduction of antimicrobials in agriculture, progress on diagnostics was “woeful”.

He said it was “alarming to me how we are not embedding state-of-the-art diagnostic technology right in the middle of our health systems”, adding that it could “really make a huge difference about whether an antibiotic is needed or not, and the right kind of antibiotic”.

“Our most aggressive recommendation was that we should ban the use of subjective prescriptions in secondary settings, at least in Western countries, until they’ve gone through a state-of-the-art diagnostics,” he continued.

“And nobody’s done it; they claim it’s a vicious circle, the technology isn’t there, but we have to give incentives in order to get this embedded because that would make a permanent difference.”

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Source: The Pharmaceutical Journal, 24 June 2022

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Covid vaccines cut global death toll by 20m in first year, study finds

Covid vaccines cut the global death toll by 20 million in the first year after they were available, according to the first major analysis.

The study, which modelled the spread of the disease in 185 countries and territories between December 2020 and December 2021, found that without Covid vaccines 31.4 million people would have died, and that 19.8 million of these deaths were avoided. The study is the first attempt to quantify the number of deaths prevented directly and indirectly as a result of Covid-19 vaccinations.

“We knew it was going to be a large number, but I did not think it would be as high as 20 million deaths during just the first year,” said Oliver Watson, of Imperial College London, who is a co-first author on the study carried out by scientists at the university.

Many more deaths could have been prevented if access to vaccines had been more equal worldwide. Nearly 600,000 additional deaths – one in five of the Covid deaths in low-income countries – could have been prevented if the World Health Organization’s global goal of vaccinating 40% of each country’s population by the end of 2021 had been met, the research found.

“Our findings show that millions of lives have likely been saved by making vaccines available to people everywhere, regardless of their wealth,” said Watson. “However, more could have been done.”

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Source: The Guardian, 24 June 2022

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Updated Freedom to Speak Up policy and guidance published

NHS England has published its new and updated national Freedom to Speak Up policy, which is applicable to primary care, secondary care and integrated care systems.

Together with NHS England, the National Guardian’s Office has also published new and updated Freedom to Speak Up guidance and a Freedom to Speak Up reflection and planning tool.

Each will help organisations deliver the People Promise for workers, by ensuring they have a voice that counts, and by developing a speaking up culture in which leaders and managers value the voice of their staff as a vital driver of learning and improvement.

NHSE is asking all trust boards to be able to evidence by the end of January 2024:

  • An update to their local Freedom to Speak Up policy to reflect the new national policy template.
  • Results of their organisation’s assessment of its Freedom to Speak Up arrangements against the revised guidance.
  • Assurance that it is on track implementing its latest Freedom to Speak Up improvement plan.

Dr Jayne Chidgey-Clark said: “The publication of the updated universal Freedom to Speak Up Policy for the sector is an opportunity for organisations to refresh their Freedom to Speak Up arrangements. The new guidance we have developed in collaboration with NHS England will help leaders throughout the sector turn that policy into a healthy and supportive Speak Up, Listen Up, Follow Up culture.”

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Source: National Guardian Freedom to Speak Up, 23 June 2022

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Covid-positive hospital patients rise a quarter in one week

The number of patients in English hospitals who have tested positive for Covid has increased 28% in a week, the steepest rise since mid-March

The third Covid wave of 2022 has now seen Covid occupation levels rise from 3,835 on 4 June to 6,401 yesterday.

The sharpest rise in the number of Covid positive patients came in the North West region, where the total rose by 43% in a week.

There are now over 1,000 Covid positive hospital patients in the North West, North East and Yorkshire, Midlands and London regions for the first time since 11 May.

Some 38% of Covid hospital patients are being treated primarily for the condition.

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Source: HSJ, 24 June 2022

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Doctor struck off for ‘repeated dishonesty’ over death of child in 1995

A doctor who attempted to cover up the true circumstances of the death in 1995 of a four-year-old patient has been struck off.

Consultant paediatric anaesthetist Dr Robert Taylor dishonestly misled police and a public inquiry about his treatment of Adam Strain, who died at the Royal Belfast Hospital for Sick Children, a medical tribunal found.

The youngster was admitted for a kidney transplant at the hospital following renal failure but did not survive surgery in November 1995.

Six months later an inquest ruled Adam died from cerebral oedema – brain swelling – partly due to the onset of dilutional hyponatraemia, which occurs when there is a shortage of sodium in the bloodstream.

Two expert anaesthetists told the coroner that the administration of an excess volume of fluids containing small amounts of sodium caused the hyponatraemia.

But Dr Taylor resisted any criticism of his fluid management and refused to accept the condition had been caused by his administration of too much of the wrong type of fluid.

In 2004 a UTV documentary When Hospitals Kill raised concerns about the treatment of a number of children, including Adam, and led to the launch of the Hyponatraemia Inquiry.

The tribunal found Dr Taylor acted dishonestly on four occasions in his dealings with the the public inquiry, including failing to disclose to the inquiry a number of clinical errors he made and falsely claiming to detectives he spoke to Adam’s mother before surgery.

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Source: The Independent, 22 June 2022

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Race to find children without full vaccination against polio in London

The NHS is urgently tracking down the parents of 35,000 five-year-old children in London who are not fully vaccinated against polio.

Health officials are hoping to contain the spread of the virus after detecting the first outbreak since 1984.

They are trying to trace it back to a “single household or street” after identifying polio in a sewage plant serving four million people in northeast London.

Experts are concerned polio, which had been eradicated in Britain in the 1980s, could take off again due to relatively low vaccination uptake in London.

Latest NHS data shows 101,000 five-year-olds in England — 15% of the total — have not had their booster polio dose, offered when they reach the age of three.

One third of these, 34,104 in total, live in London. Jane Clegg, the chief NHS nurse for London said they are “reaching out to parents of children aged under five in London who are not up-to-date with their polio vaccinations to invite them to get protected.”

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Source: The Times, 23 June 2022

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Cost of living: GPs warning over rise in prescription requests

The cost of living crisis is adding to pressures on GPs, the British Medical Association (BMA) in Northern Ireland has warned.

The BMA said that is because the number of people asking for prescriptions for medicines that can be bought over the counter is increasing.

That includes medicines like painkillers and allergy medication, Dr Alan Stout of the BMA said.

Prescriptions are free for everyone in Northern Ireland.

The rise in prescription request increases "the cost to the health service as a whole and the pressure on GPs", Dr Stout told Ulster's Good Morning Ulster programme.

"We have talked before about the difficulties people have accessing GPs and this is just more demand and difficulties," he said.

Dr Stout added: "I absolutely don't hold that against anyone, it is not our position as GPs to deny people medication or deny people prescriptions if they need this medication."

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Source: BBC News, 23 June 2022

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Leak reveals priorities of NHS long-term plan refresh

A drive to ‘transform’ access to urgent, emergency and planned care will be added to the goals of the NHS long-term plan, a document leaked to HSJ has revealed

The  long-term plan for the NHS was originally published in January 2019. Last September, NHS England said it was reviewing the commitments made within the plan, with senior officials warning that many of them could not be met after the damage of the pandemic.

HSJ has seen a document prepared for the most recent meeting of the NHS Assembly which sets out NHSE’s approach to the refresh.

Strategic developments expected include better joined-up community based and preventive care, transform access to urgent, emergency and planned care, improve care quality and operations, and tackle health inequalities, improve population health and develop a sustainable health service through greater collaboration.

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Source: HSJ, 24 June 2022

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Birmingham hospital faces criminal probe after death of vulnerable man

A hospital and one of its managers are facing a criminal investigation into the death of a vulnerable man who absconded by climbing a fence.

An inquest concluded failings amounting to neglect contributed to the death of Matthew Caseby in 2020, after he fled from Birmingham's Priory Hospital Woodbourne and was hit by a train.

The investigation will be carried out by the Care Quality Commission (CQC). Priory said it would co-operate fully "if enquiries are raised by the CQC".

Mr Caseby, 23, climbed over a 2.3m-high (7ft 6in) courtyard fence on 7 September 2020. He was found dead the following day after being hit by a train near Birmingham's University station.

The inquest in April heard other patients had previously climbed the fence and, despite concerns by members of staff, no action was taken to improve security in and around the courtyard until another patient absconded two months after Mr Caseby's death.

Following the inquest, coroner Louise Hunt said she was concerned the fence and courtyard area may still not be safe and urged health chiefs to consider imposing minimum standards for perimeter fences at mental health units.

She also criticised record-keeping and how risk assessments were carried out.

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Source: BBC News, 23 June 2022

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USA: Cerner’s VA software rollout report cites 150 “cases of harm”

A serious revelation may derail the Cerner Millenium rollout. A draft report by the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Office of Inspector General (OIG) states that a flaw in Cerner’s software caused the system to lose 11,000 orders for specialty care, lab work, and other services – without alerting healthcare providers the orders (also known as referrals) had been lost. This created ‘cases of harm’ to at least 150 veterans in care. 

The VA patient safety team classified dozens of cases of “moderate harm” and one case of “major harm.” The major harm cited affected a homeless veteran, aged in his 60s, who was identified as at risk for suicide and had seen a psychiatrist at Mann-Grandstaff in December 2020, after the implementation. After prescribing medication to treat depression, the psychiatrist ordered a follow-up appointment one month later. That order disappeared in the electronic health record and was not scheduled. The consequences were that the veteran, weeks after the unscheduled appointment date, called the Veterans Crisis Line. He was going to kill himself with a razor. Fortunately, he was found in time by local first responders, taken to a non-VA mental health unit, and hospitalized.

The draft report implies that the ‘unknown queue’ problem has not been fixed and continues to put veterans at risk in the VA system.

There may be as many as 60 other safety problems. Other incidents cited in the draft report include one of “catastrophic harm” and another case the VA told the OIG may be reclassified as catastrophic. Catastrophic harm is defined by the VA as “death or permanent loss of function.”

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Source: Telehealth and Telecare Aware, 21 June 2022

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RCGP warns 19,000 GPs could quit in 'mass exodus' over next five years

Polling by the Royal College of General Practice (RCGP) as part of a campaign to make NHS GP services sustainable for the future found that 42% of 1,262 GPs and trainees who took part said they were likely to quit the profession in the next five years.

A workforce exodus on this scale would strip the health service of nearly 19,000 of the roughly 45,000 headcount GPs and GP trainees currently working in general practice.

RCGP chair Professor Martin Marshall warned that general practice was a profession in crisis - with the intensity and complexity of GP workload rising as the workforce continued to shrink.

He warned that 'alarming' findings from the RCGP poll must serve as a stark warning to politicians and NHS leaders over the urgent need for solutions to begin to tackle the crisis facing general practice.

Four in five respondents told the RCGP they expect working in general practice to get worse over the next few years - while only 6% expected things to improve.

Nearly two in five respondents said GP practice premises are not fit for purpose, and one in three said IT for booking systems is not good enough.

Professor Marshall said: 'What our members are telling us about working on the frontline of general practice is alarming. General practice is significantly understaffed, underfunded, and overworked and this is impacting on the care and services we’re able to deliver to patients.

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Source: GP, 22 June 2022

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NHS warns of scam Covid-test texts

The NHS is warning about widespread scam text messages telling recipients they have been in close contact with a Covid case.

"We've seen reports of fake NHS text messages about ordering Omicron Covid-19 test kits," it tweeted.

Close contacts of people who have tested positive are no longer advised to test.

The aim of the messages appears to be harvesting financial and personal information.

In its alert, the NHS says it will "never ask for bank details, so please be aware of suspicious messages".

Most people are no longer advised to test for Covid and are ineligible for free tests - but some some pharmacies and shops sell them.

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Source: BBC News, 22 June 2022

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