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New data published by NHS England has revealed the number of patients waiting at more than 18 months and 2 years.
Insights show the trusts waiting times were not particularly caused by the pandemic, but rather had a backlog since before the outbreak of Covid-19.
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Source: HSJ, 10 June 2021
Twenty-three hospital trusts had more than a third of their core bedbase occupied by COVID-19 patients on Tuesday, and occupancy is still rising at all but one.
Three trusts (North Middlesex in north London, as well as Medway and Dartford and Gravesham in Kent) had more than half of general and acute beds occupied by patients who had the virus, and others were not far behind.
Several trusts saw their covid occupancy share up by more than 10 percentage points in a week — a rate of growth which would soon see them entirely filled by covid patients, a situation with radical consequences for emergency hospital care in those areas.
London as a whole had a third of these beds occupied by patients with COVID-19.
HSJ has analysed data published for the first time by NHS England last night. The data concerns the status of adult general and acute beds, which make up the large majority of the acute bedbase. They do not include intensive care, which is also now under huge pressure in London, the south east and the east of England. Most hospitals in these areas are stretching IC capacity above normal levels.
Such high covid occupancy in both intensive care and the core bedbase is putting severe strain on hospitals’ ability to treat other patients. Most or all of the trusts under the greatest pressure have now cancelled routine planned surgery, and many are struggling with crowding, delays getting patients into and out of emergency departments due to the space available, and a lack of staff.
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Source: HSJ, 1 January 2021
30,000 people believe they are victims of negligence each week in the UK, new research carried out by YouGov for Injury Awareness Week (26-30 June) has found.
Participants were asked if they have suffered an injury or illness in the last year which was caused because of negligence, for example by another road user, an employer, a colleague, or a medic.
“We need to shine a light on the impact these injuries can have on people who were doing nothing more than living their lives before they fell victim to the recklessness or carelessness of others,” said Mike Benner, chief executive of the Association of Personal Injury Lawyers (APIL) which commissioned the Injury Awareness Week study.
“Often these injures are severe, some are life-changing, and some are life-ending,” he said.
“The fact that the harm has been caused by negligence is significant, because negligence could and should be avoided,” said Mr Benner.
“An accident is simply an incident which no-one could have reasonably foreseen. Negligence is doing something, or failing to do something, that could cause injury to others. Employers have a duty to make sure we return home from a day’s work unscathed, for example, and drivers need to take care to not harm fellow road users.
“If someone were to take one thing away from this Injury Awareness Week, it’s the knowledge that any one of us could be among the 30,000 injured needlessly in a week. Avoidable injuries are an issue we should all be concerned about,” he said.
Source: APIL, 22 June 2023
New data has found patients in ambulances experienced significant delays in hospital admissions before the pandemic began. The data revealed patients were waiting for up to an hour or more before they were given to the care of A&E staff and may have had to wait in the ambulance or A&E corridors before they could be admitted to the hospital.
It has also been found that in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic, patients were having to wait even longer before they could be admitted into hospital. A case report by West Midlands Ambulance Service detailed how a woman in her nineties experienced worsening health whilst waiting for treatment and died a short time later.
Source: The Independent, 08 June 2021
A new bill which will allow patients’ data to be easily transferable across the NHS has been introduced to Parliament.
Delivered by the Department for Science, Innovation, and Technology (DSIT), the bill will require IT suppliers for the health and care sector to ensure their systems meet common standards to enable data sharing across platforms.
The Data Use and Access Bill will enable healthcare information to be easily accessed in real time across all NHS trusts, GP surgeries and ambulance services, whichever IT system they are using.
A press release, published by DSIT on 24 October 2024, said that the measure “will free up 140,000 hours in NHS staff time every year, providing quicker care for patients and potentially saving lives”.
Government launches online platform to shape 10 year health plan
The government has launched an online engagement platform for members of the public, NHS staff and experts to share their ideas to shape its forthcoming 10 year health plan.
Change.NHS.uk will be live until the start of 2025, and available via the NHS App.
The public engagement exercise will help shape the government’s 10 year health plan which will be published in spring 2025 and will be underlined by three big shifts in healthcare – hospital to community, analogue to digital, and sickness to prevention.
Source: Digital Health, 24 October 2024
Women in some parts of the country are half as likely to be diagnosed with ovarian cancer as elsewhere, new analysis of NHS data has revealed.
The proportion of women diagnosed at an early stage of the disease, when it is most susceptible to treatment, varied in some areas from 22% to 63%.
UK survival rates for cancer have lagged behind other countries and NHS England has set a target to improve early diagnosis with an ambition to have 75% of all cancers diagnosed early by 2028.
The ovarian cancer audit data shows the UK is far from achieving this with only 33% of cancers diagnosed at stage one or two while 50% of cancers were detected at stage three and four.
Chief Executive of Ovarian Cancer Action, Cary Wakefield, said: “Diagnosing ovarian cancer at the earliest stages is crucial, but sadly as we gather data it is clear that a postcode lottery exists around the country, with some areas diagnosing significantly more patients early than others. We want to see all patients diagnosed early enough to get treatment and survive this disease, no matter where they live.”
Source: The Independent, 9 January 2020
NHS England will begin monitoring and benchmarking systems on the extent to which patients are given the option to be treated by a private provider.
The move follows the government today endorsing the recommendations of a review by the chair of the newly created Independent Patient Choice and Procurement Panel, which has highlighted how some local areas are restricting patient choice.
It highlighted significant variation in choice between some systems, which it said was driven by factors including messaging from commissioners to GPs that discourages choice and/or encourages referrals to local NHS trusts, financial incentives for referrals to particular providers and difficulties in securing accreditation from commissioners.
It cited one example where the operator of an independent sector hospital that is co-located with an NHS hospital was contractually prevented by the NHS trust from accepting certain referrals.
Health and social care secretary Victoria Atkins said: “Empowering patients to take control of their own healthcare decisions is a key part of my missions to make the NHS faster, simpler and fairer for everyone that uses it.”
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Source: HSJ, 15 May 2024
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The Care Quality Commission’s assessments of integrated care systems (ICSs) have been put on hold at the last minute, as the government declined to sign off on the process.
They were due to begin this month, following pilots in Birmingham and Solihull and Dorset ICSs, but the Care Quality Commission (CQC) has put the brakes on assessments elsewhere until it receives government approval.
Under the legislation brought in when ICSs were set up in 2022, the CQC can review and assess systems, but ministers must approve its methodology.
Interim chief inspector of adult social care and integrated care James Bullion wrote to integrated care board chiefs this week stating that, following discussions with the Department of Health and Social Care, the CQC had agreed to a “short delay… to allow for further refinements to our approach”.
He added: “In particular we have been working with NHS England on their strengthened approach to performance evaluation and rating of the ICB elements of the ICS which we will take into account as evidence for our scoring and reporting approach.”
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Source: HSJ, 8 April 2024
A new COVID-19 test that is able to detect even asymptomatic cases of the virus through saliva is being piloted in the UK.
The new LamPORE test, developed by UK-based company Oxford Nanopore, will be tested in mobile laboratories in four areas across the country.
It is already being used in Aberdeen, with plans to roll it out in Telford, Brent and Newbury, and results so far have shown it is even effective at detecting the virus in people who are not showing symptoms.
LamPORE will allow for additional testing capacity where it is needed for large numbers of people and be used alongside existing PCR and lateral flow test, the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) said.
Source: The Independent, 28 January 2021
A new wave of coronavirus infections could throw into jeopardy efforts to clear a backlog of surgery in the NHS, experts have warned.
They say the relaxation of Covid restrictions is expected to cause a rise in infections, while at least some resurgence in hospital admissions and deaths is also expected at some point. However, the sharp rise in cases of a variant of concern first discovered in India, B.1.617.2, has caused consternation, with modelling suggesting that if it is as transmissible as some estimates suggest, it could fuel a serious “third wave”.
Now experts have said that a new wave of infections may cause further problems, exacerbating what has already been described as “a truly frightening backlog” of care.
“We are anticipating that as lockdown is eased that cases are going to go back up slightly, that is with or without the Indian variant,” Dr David Strain, a senior clinical lecturer at the University of Exeter medical school, told the Guardian. “The biggest concern we’ve got is that if these [Covid case] numbers do start to go up, it will put a strain on trying to get other services up and running.”
“GPs are crying out under the stress at the moment … we still have people not having their operations: we have had procedures postponed for over 12 months, and we have got longer waiting lists that ever before,” he said.
Source: The Guardian, 20 May 2021
An immunologist has warned the new strain of Covid-19 could be causing different symptoms – including one that emerges during the night.
Omicron BA.5 is a highly-contagious subvariant prompting concern as it contributes to a fresh wave of infections across the globe, including the UK. Scientists have been finding differences with previous strains, including the ability to reinfect people within weeks of having Covid.
“One extra symptom from BA.5 I saw this morning is night sweats,” Professor Luke O’Neill from Trinity College Dublin told an Irish radio station in mid-July.
Source: The Independent (24 August 2022)
Federal authorities are preparing to approve updated coronavirus vaccines targeting the latest virus variants late next week, a move that could make shots available before Labor Day, according to a federal health official and a person familiar with the plans who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a confidential process.
The mRNA shots manufactured by Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna designed to target the KP.2 variant can hit the market within days of approval by the Food and Drug Administration. A third protein-based vaccine made by Novavax, preferred by people who are cautious about mRNA vaccines or who have had bad reactions to them, will probably take longer to be approved and will be distributed in subsequent weeks, according to the federal health official.
The arrival of new vaccines comes three months after the start of a summer covid wave that is receding in some places.
The timing of the release is too late for Americans who were looking to shore up their immunity before summer travel and the return of the school year, or for those who face heightened risk because of their age or underlying conditions. In recent weeks, some people weighed whether to get an outdated vaccine for partial protection more quickly or to hang on for the updated version. And those who didn’t want to wait discovered existing shots were no longer easy to find.
“That’s simply unfortunate timing, given the high levels of covid-19 circulating now and the large number of vulnerable people due for vaccination who didn’t get it months ago and are now motivated and anxious,” said Kelly Moore, president and CEO of Immunize.org, an organization that educates clinicians about vaccines.
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Source: Washington Post, 16 August 2024
COVID-19 is stable for several hours to days in aerosols and on surfaces, according to a new study from National Institutes of Health, CDC, UCLA and Princeton University scientists in The New England Journal of Medicine.
The scientists found that severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) was detectable in aerosols for up to three hours, up to four hours on copper, up to 24 hours on cardboard and up to two to three days on plastic and stainless steel. The results provide key information about the stability of SARS-CoV-2, which causes COVID-19 disease, and suggests that people may acquire the virus through the air and after touching contaminated objects.
The findings affirm the guidance from public health professionals to use precautions similar to those for influenza and other respiratory viruses to prevent the spread of SARS-CoV-2:
Source: National Institutes of Health, 17 March 2020
Breast surgeon Ian Paterson, was convicted and jailed for 20 years for performing unnecessary and dangerous surgery on women over the span of 14 years, being found guilty of 17 counts of wounding with intent and three counts of unlawful wounding. Thousands of his patients are only now just learning that they experienced unnecessary tests and surgery when there was no clinical need, having never been properly reviewed after his conduct had been revealed.
Now, Spire Healthcare may be facing up to £50 million in compensation costs with the NHS and insurers having also paid £10 million.
Linda Millband, head of clinical negligence at Thompsons Solicitors has said "“It is clear people have been missed and we will be urging anyone who believes they may have been a victim of Ian Paterson, at any time, to come forward and seek compensation for their injuries. Our job is to ensure any victim of Paterson, whenever they may have been contacted, get the maximum compensation.”
Source: The Independent, 27 July 2021
New NHS pelvic health clinics have been set up to help and support thousands of pregnant women and new mothers who are experiencing incontinence and other issues related to the pelvic floor.
Women receiving care at 14 new pilot sites will be treated throughout their pregnancy. Among the treatment, women will learn how to perform pelvic floor exercises with a physiotherapist as well as receive advice on diet with continued support and monitoring throughout.
Source: NHS England, 13 June 2021
NHS England is set to launch 15 new specialist clinics for children living with severe obesity after the Covid pandemic shone a ‘harsh light’ on the crisis among vulnerable young people.
Obesity currently affects one in five children in the UK. Each year, around one thousand children between the age of two to 18-years-old, and their family members, will benefit from the pilot scheme.
The scheme will also offer access to dietitians, psychologists, specialist nurses, social workers, youth workers and a children’s doctor.
Amanda Pritchard, chief executive of the NHS in England, described the coronavirus pandemic said: “The pandemic has shone a harsh light on obesity - with many vulnerable young people struggling with weight gain during the pandemic.
“Left unchecked, obesity can have other very serious consequences, ranging from diabetes to cancer.
“This early intervention scheme aims to prevent children and young people enduring a lifetime of ill-health.
“The NHS Long Term Plan committed to take more action to help children and young people with their physical and mental health and these new services are a landmark moment in efforts to help them lead longer, healthier and happier lives.”
Source: The Independent, 15 November 2021
The new chief of the UK’s crisis-hit nursing watchdog has admitted it got things “completely wrong” following a series of revelations by The Independent exposing a “toxic” culture in which rogue nurses were free to work in the NHS.
In his first national interview as head of the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC), Paul Rees apologised for a string of scandals which have dogged the watchdog and prompted a major overhaul of the beleaguered organisation.
He admitted the regulator – which is responsible for overseeing nearly 800,000 nurses, midwives and nursing associates in the UK – had got its handling of sexual misconduct cases “completely wrong” when it refused to investigate nurses who had been accused of committing sexual assault outside of work.
He also conceded the body should have suspended Lucy Letby when she was first arrested. The NMC failed to suspend the nurse until she was charged with a series of shocking crimes a year later, blaming a loophole in its guidance. Mr Rees has now admitted that was wrong, after this publication uncovered a secret report into failings over the convicted killer’s treatment.
He told The Independent: “We have to be honest about things that have gone wrong. And things have gone wrong in the past.”
Ten months into his role, Mr Rees insists the watchdog, the largest professional regulator in Europe, has undergone a major change of its leadership team. But he warned it could take years to turn around the organisation, which was found in an independent review to have a “dysfunctional” and “toxic” culture due to evidence of racism and sexism within its ranks.
Source: The Independent, 9 November 2025
Karen Titchener is a determined woman with an eight-year plan to make Scotland the safest place in the world for patients.
She starts as Scotland’s newly appointed Patient Safety Commissioner, facing years-long waiting lists for appointments, bed blocking and countless other problems.
She says: “It is a big job. There’s a lot to do, but I aim to do it.”
Titchener has decades of leadership experience around the UK and US where she was Vice-President of Hospital At Home, something she describes as “one of the biggest revolutions in medical care”.
She wants Scotland to expand the 16,000 number of patients cared for at home last year, helped by a £85 million budget boost. She said: “This is vital for relieving pressure on the system.
“For a busy mum with other children to look after and a home to run, having your ill child cared for by Hospital At Home has to be a positive. This service is a success only if we continue to ensure patients receive the quality of care they would in a hospital.”
Titchener promises to publish reports and recommendations. She said: “I’m a believer in openness and transparency. If we promise to do something and it doesn’t happen, there has to be accountability.
“I want to see us moving to a culture of preventing harm rather than reacting after harm has already happened.”
Source: Sunday Post, 1 September 2025
Mike Ramsay has been appointed new Chairman of the Patient Safety Movement Foundation, taking over from Joe Kiani.
The Patient Safety Movement's goal is to get to ZERO preventable deaths. In their latest newsletter, Mike discusses how he intends to build on the tremendous momentum gained so far.
"We are not competing with any organization but strongly support entities with the patient safety goal and hope that we can all pull together and use all our resources to reach zero preventable deaths and zero harm. Zero is our target and we can get there!"
Read Mike's Letter in the March Patient Safety Movement Foundation newsletter
England’s mental health inpatient system is “running very hot” and operating well above recommended occupancy levels, HSJ has been told, as new funding to address the problem is revealed.
The move was announced by NHS England mental health director Claire Murdoch in an exclusive interview with HSJ.
It comes amid a steep rise in mental health patients waiting more than 12 hours in accident and emergency. Last month, an HSJ investigation revealed 12-hour waits for people in crisis had ballooned by 150% in 2022 compared to pre-pandemic levels. Problems finding specialist beds have been cited by experts as one of the root causes of A&E breaches.
Ms Murdoch told HSJ the funds would not come from ”within the mental health service budget” and that they would be used to “help address any pressures where we think the answer is more of either beds or other urgent and emergency care which has a capital need.”
NHSE is now working with the 42 integrated care systems to determine where the money can best be used. Ms Murdoch said the money would be spent ”where there is a particular need” and that there was “no blanket approach” to its allocation.
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Source: HSJ, 10 August 2022
Following a government announcement, a new body set to tackle health disparities in the UK will launch on Friday 1 October.
The Office for Health Improvement and Disparities (OHID) aims to tackle health inequalities across the country and will be co-led by newly appointed Deputy Chief Medical Officer (DCMO), Dr Jeanelle de Gruchy.
The OHID will play a vital role in the Department of Health and Social Care, driving the prevention agenda throughout the government to minimise health disparities, many of which have been exacerbated by the pandemic, and improve the public’s health.
Unfortunately, health disparities around the UK are austere. For example, a woman living in Blackpool will on average live 16 fewer years in good health than a woman born in Brent, London.
The government is also aware that ethnicity can impact health and health outcomes.
Health disparities can consequently undermine a person’s ability to work and live a long, healthy and independent life, whilst putting pressure on the NHS, social care and other public services.
Source: National Health Executive, 7 September 2021
Coeliacs may soon no longer need to eat large amounts of gluten – the very thing suspected of making them sick – to get an accurate diagnosis.
Australian research published in the journal Gastroenterology showed a blood test for gluten-specific T cells had a high accuracy in diagnosing coeliac disease, even when no gluten was eaten.
Around 1% of people in western countries have coeliac disease, an autoimmune condition in which gluten causes an inflammatory reaction in the small bowel.
Currently, every approved method to diagnose it requires people to eat gluten, the paper said.
Current testing methods – blood tests or a gastroscopy – require weeks of a person eating gluten, while often enduring symptoms such as diarrhoea, abdominal pain and bloating.
Despite the importance of early diagnosis, the researchers said many people are deterred because they do not want to get sick from the tests.
More than one in two cases of coeliac disease are either undiagnosed or diagnosed late, prior research has shown.
“There are likely millions of people around the world living with undiagnosed coeliac disease simply because the path to diagnosis is difficult, and at times, debilitating,” said Assoc Prof Jason Tye-Din, a senior author of the paper and head of the Coeliac Research Laboratory at the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research (WEHI) in Melbourne, Australia.
The new research could be a “game-changer”, helping address “one of the biggest deterrents in current diagnostic practices”, Tye-Din said.
Source: The Guardian, 10 June 2025
The NHS has started rolling out a new at-home heart monitor designed to detect heart rhythm problems.
Unlike traditional monitors that can require lengthy set-up by a trained physiologist, the innovative kit can be posted to patients for them to attach themselves at home and used to investigate conditions including atrial fibrillation, tachycardia or heart blocks.
The device itself is a small patch that adheres to the skin, while traditional devices see patients hooked up to numerous wires and monitors during hospital visits.
After the new tool is worn for a few days, patients simply post the monitor back, removing the necessity for appointments to fit and remove the equipment.
The collected data is then analysed by an artificial intelligence (AI) tool called Cardiologs, which generates a report for assessment by a physiologist or doctor.
Frimley Health NHS Foundation Trust is the first hospital in the country to roll out the device, with hopes that the device will soon be used across other NHS trusts.
Source: The Independent, 14 July 2025
Doctors, scientists and researchers have built an artificial intelligence (AI) model that can accurately identify cancer in a development they say could speed up diagnosis of the disease and fast-track patients to treatment.
Cancer is a leading cause of death worldwide. It results in about 10 million deaths annually, or nearly one in six deaths, according to the World Health Organization. In many cases, however, the disease can be cured if detected early and treated swiftly.
The AI tool designed by experts at the Royal Marsden NHS foundation trust, the Institute of Cancer Research, London, and Imperial College London can identify whether abnormal growths found on CT scans are cancerous.
The algorithm performs more efficiently and effectively than current methods, according to a study. The findings have been published in the Lancet’s eBioMedicine journal.
“In the future, we hope it will improve early detection and potentially make cancer treatment more successful by highlighting high-risk patients and fast-tracking them to earlier intervention,” said Dr Benjamin Hunter, a clinical oncology registrar at the Royal Marsden and a clinical research fellow at Imperial.
Source: The Guardian, 30 April 2023
Major reforms have been set out on how NHS organisations should respond to patient safety incidents, which are aimed at ensuring better engagement with patients and families.
The Patient Safety Incident Response Framework (PSIRF), published today, replaces the serious incident framework and provides guidance to trusts on how and when they should conduct investigations.
According to NHSE, a key aim is to allow trusts to focus resources on where investigations will have the greatest impact, rather than investigating all incidents as they did under the old framework.
NHSE said the more flexible approach should make it easier to address concerns specific to health inequalities, as incidents can be learnt from that would not have met the serious incident definition.
However, it does not affect the need for a patient safety incident investigation following a never event’ or maternity incident; this is still required.
Helen Hughes, chief executive of charity Patient Safety Learning, said the new framework “places an emphasis on individual organisations assessing their patient safety risks”, and provided a “welcome acknowledgement of the importance of engaging patients and families as part of the investigation process”.
However, she said there would need to be a “significant training programme for staff in a range of human factors informed approaches”, to ensure reviews lead to safety improvements.
She added: “What is being proposed is a complex innovation in the NHS’s approach to incident investigation. Its success to a large part will depend on having the right organisational leadership and resources to support this transition. [NHSE has] now provided a set of tools and a timetable for this. However, ultimately this initiative should be judged on its implementation and effectiveness in reducing avoidable harm.”
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Source: HSJ, 16 August 202
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