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UK lab investigated for false negative Covid tests is not fully accredited

The private laboratory that is under investigation for potentially issuing more than 40,000 false negative Covid tests was not fully accredited to perform the work, contrary to assurances made by health officials.

The UK’s independent accreditation service, Ukas, told the Guardian on Monday that neither Immensa Health Clinics Ltd nor its sister company, Dante Labs, had ever been accredited by the service, and that it had informed the Department of Health that statements suggesting otherwise were incorrect.

The UK Health Security Agency announced on Friday that it was suspending operations at Immensa’s laboratory in Wolverhampton pending an investigation into concerns that at least 43,000 people with coronavirus had been wrongly told their swabs tested negative for the virus.

Because many of the individuals would have believed the typically more accurate PCR tests performed by Immensa over simpler lateral flow tests, there is a substantial risk they unwittingly spread the virus on to thousands more people.

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Source: The Guardian, 18 October 2021

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NHS England hospitals having to rely on ‘obsolete’ imaging equipment

About a third of NHS trusts in England are using “technically obsolete” imaging equipment that could be putting patients’ health at risk, while existing shortages of doctors who are qualified to diagnose and treat disease and injuries using medical imaging techniques could triple by 2030.

According to data obtained through freedom of information requests by Channel 4’s Dispatches programme, 27.1% of trusts in NHS England have at least one computerised tomography (CT) scanner that is 10 years old or more, while 34.5% have at least one magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scanner in the same category. These are used to diagnose various conditions including cancer, stroke and heart disease, detect damage to bones and internal organs, or guide further treatment.

An NHS England report published last year recommended that all imaging equipment aged 10 years or older be replaced. Software upgrades may not be possible on older equipment, limiting its use, while older CT scanners may require higher radiation doses to deliver the same image, it said.

Dr Julian Elford, a consultant radiologist and medical director at the Royal College of Radiologists (RCR), said: “CT and MRI machines start to become technically obsolete at 10 years. Older kit breaks down frequently, is slower, and produces poorer quality images, so upgrading is critical."

“We don’t just need upgraded scanners, though; we need significantly more scanners in the first place. The [NHS England report] called for doubling the number of scanners – we firmly support that call, and recommend a government-funded programme for equipment replacement on an appropriate cycle so that radiologists can diagnose and treat their patients safely."

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Source: The Guardian, 18 October 2021

 

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Stillbirth rate high for black and Asian babies in UK

Stillbirth rates remain "exceptionally high" for black and Asian babies in the UK, a report examining baby loss in 2019 has found.

The figures come despite improving numbers overall, with some 610 fewer stillbirths in 2019 than in 2013.

The MBRRACE-UK report found babies of mothers living in deprived areas are at higher risk of stillbirths and neonatal deaths than those in other places.

Charities say there is an urgent need to tackle inequalities around birth.

There were some 2,399 stillbirths (a death occurring before or during birth once a pregnancy has reached 24 weeks) and 1,158 neonatal deaths (babies who die in the first 28 days of life) in the UK in 2019.

The report, by the Universities of Leicester and Oxford, found:

  • Overall stillbirth rates fell from 4.2 per 1,000 births in 2013 to 3.35 per 1,000 births in 2019
  • For babies of black and black British ethnicity, stillbirth rates were 7.23 per 1,000 births
  • For babies of Asian and Asian British ethnicity, stillbirth rates were 5.05 per 1,000 births
  • For babies of white ethnicity, stillbirth rates were 3.22 per 1,000 births.

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Source: BBC News, 15 October 2021

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Care increasingly disrupted by building failures as NHS repair bill grows

The increase in estates-related problems disrupting clinical services comes despite the government handing out £600m to trusts last year to modernise their facilities, and at a time when the NHS is struggling to bring down elective waiting lists and handle high emergency demand.

Annual figures published by NHS Digital yesterday show nearly 7,000 “clinical service incidents caused by estates and infrastructure failure” in 2020-21. This marks a 15% increase on the previous year, although it is less than the level of growth in 2017-18 (25 per cent) and 2018-19 (22%).

The incidents are defined as infrastructure failures which cause delays, cancellations or other interference with clinical services. This includes issues like power outages, building defects, and even a lack of estates and facilities staff such as porters.

High-risk estate is defined as needing “urgent priority” to prevent “catastrophic failure, major disruption to clinical services, or deficiencies” in safety which are “liable to cause serious injury and/or prosecution”.

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Source: HSJ, 15 December 2021

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World Menopause Day: "We have to better support women"

MP Carolyn Harris is part of a movement determined to smash the remnants of the menopause taboo, pushing a private member’s bill to turn up the volume on a debate about the menopause that is growing louder by the day.

As an increasing number of countries, businesses and individuals mark World Menopause Day today, Harris says she is ready to shame whoever stands in the way of progress.

Harris will lead a small army of supporters to Parliament Square in London before her bill, which is due to be heard on the 29 October, to demand free prescriptions for hormone replacement therapy in England – already available in Scotland and Wales. The government is said to be “interested” in the bill, with Harris adding that she has cross-party support from dozens of MP.

“In the last two years the narrative has completely changed,” says Harris, who adds that since the private members bill was announced she’s had calls from countries from Canada and the US, to Australia and Japan.

“People are waking up to the fact that we have to find a better way of supporting women through the menopause,” she says. “Women are enhanced coming through this process, but only if they get the support they need.”

The evidence suggests they all too often don’t. There are more than 13 million currently experiencing menopause or perimenopause in the UK. Menopause campaigners argue that medical sexism and a lack of training means many women are left to suffer the symptoms of menopause – which can include depression, anxiety, insomnia and brain fog as well as hot flushes.

Harris’s own experience with the menopause was brutal. Twenty years after losing her eight-year-old son in a road traffic accident she blamed herself for not processing her grief when she was hit by a deep depression. “It took me six years, having conversations with women, for me to realise I was going through the menopause,” she says.

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Source: The Guardian, 18 October 2021

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Pregnant women at risk from NHS workers’ mixed messages over safety of jab

Pregnant women are being advised by some health professionals not to have the Covid vaccine despite an edict from the NHS that they should encourage them to get the jab. One in six of the most critically ill Covid patients requiring life-saving care are unvaccinated pregnant women, figures released last week show.

Yet messages sent to the Vaccines and Pregnancy helpline, launched on 20 August to help pregnant women navigate information about the vaccine, suggest that some midwives are advising against the jab.

One said: “I was initially keen to have the vaccine and then advised by a midwife not to have it.” Another wrote: “I had my first dose before I knew I was pregnant. Now I’m pregnant I’ve been told I’m not allowed my second.” Another reported: “I’ve been advised by midwives not to get the vaccine due to the impact on ovulation and menstruation.”

The helpline was set up by the organisation Full Fact in partnership with the campaign group Pregnant Then Screwed. Many of those contacting it complained of conflicting advice while others were pushed from pillar to post. One said: “I’m pregnant and really confused about getting the vaccine. I’ve spoken to my health visitor, who said speak to your GP, the GP said speak to your midwife, and the midwife said they can’t advise me.”

Full Fact’s deputy editor, Claire Milne, said the helpline was established to counter misinformation about the vaccine. She explained: “It’s not right so many pregnant women have been left scared for their safety and that of their unborn children.

“Messaging around the safety of the vaccines in pregnancy has been, at times, confused. It’s vital that up-to-date information is available – especially when speaking with health professionals.”

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Source: The Guardian, 17 October 2021

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Trusts failing to report ‘concerning’ numbers of hospital-acquired covid cases

Some acute trusts have failed to report large numbers of hospital-acquired covid infections as patient safety incidents, despite NHS England describing this as ‘fundamental’. 

HSJ examined the numbers of “infection control” patient safety incidents reported to the national reporting and learning system in 2020-21, and compared this to separate NHS England data on covid infections most likely to have been acquired in hospital.

The number of incidents reported to the NRLS in the 12-month period should in theory be higher, as it covers all types of hospital-acquired infections, while the NHSE data only covered covid infections in the last seven months of the year. 

This appears to hold true nationally, with almost 59,000 incidents reported to the NRLS, compared to around 36,000 likely hospital-acquired covid infections suggested by the NHSE data. But for around a third of trusts, the incident numbers reported to the NRLS were smaller, with some appearing to report very low numbers.

Helen Hughes, chief executive of patient safety charity Patient Safety Learning, said: “The scale of the under-reporting set out in these findings is particularly concerning.”

“As this data informs assessment of performance at both organisational and national levels, it is possible that this could create a false assurance about the extent of harm in this period,” Ms Hughes said.

“Where organisations are now retrospectively completing serious incident reports, there are obvious questions as to whether key insights will have been lost as memories of incidents fade over time and their causes.”

“However, they rely on the capacity and commitment of staff behind them. The pandemic has placed an enormous strain on the health service and we have heard from staff the time constraints this has put on them to report patient safety incidents,” she added. 

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Source: HSJ, 15 October 2021

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Austerity since 2010 linked to tens of thousands more deaths than expected

Austerity measures introduced by David Cameron’s coalition government after 2010 can be linked to tens of thousands of additional deaths, according to a damning new study.

A paper published by researchers at the University of York concluded that reductions in funding to health can be linked to an extra 57,550 fatalities.

Researchers looked at the healthcare spending of the Conservative and Liberal Democrat government after 2010.

The researchers said the results of their paper confirmed what had been reported in previous studies.

But the conclusions of causal impact of social care, public health and healthcare expenditure on mortality in England, published in the BMJ Open journal, make “a major contribution by additionally estimating the effect of social care expenditure,” its authors said.

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Source: The Independent, 15 October 2021

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CQC criticises care scandal trust for 'unsafe staffing'

The trust at the centre of a maternity scandal does not have enough midwifery staff to keep women and babies safe, a Care Quality Commission (CQC)inspection has revealed.

East Kent Hospitals University Foundation Trust relied on community midwives to fill slots at its acute unit, with some of them working 20-hour days after being called in to help cover and feeling outside of their competence.

The trust had suspended a midwife-led unit and diverted women in labour to other hospitals – and when the CQC raised the understaffing issue at its inspection in July, it suspended its home birth service. But the CQC found that the number of midwives and maternity workers on duty rarely matched planned numbers and managers rarely calculated staffing numbers accurately, with some elements of the workload not being factored in.

Lack of staff meant there was a risk to the safe assessment and monitoring of women and babies at the trust’s William Harvey Hospital in Ashford. Unqualified staff were having to deal with telephone queries from women who needed advice and support.

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Source: HSJ, 15 October 2021

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Covid test lab suspended over wrong results

Around 43,000 people in England may have been wrongly told their Covid-19 test was negative because of errors at a lab.

Testing at the Wolverhampton laboratory has been suspended following an investigation by NHS Test and Trace.

It is now contacting those affected, mainly in the south west region, to ask them to take another Covid test.

Concerns were raised when people had positive lateral flow tests but negative PCR results from the lab.

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Source: BBC News, 15 October 2021

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White doctors in London are six times more likely to be offered jobs than black doctors

White doctors applying for medical posts in London are six times more likely to be offered a job than black applicants, figures released under the Freedom of Information Act show.

The new data also show that white doctors are four times more likely to be successful than Asian candidates or candidates from a mixed ethnic background.

The figures were uncovered by Sheila Cunliffe, a senior human resources professional who works in workforce transformation across the NHS and the wider public sector. Cunliffe sent freedom of information requests to all 18 NHS acute trusts in London asking for a breakdown by ethnicity for 2020-21 of the numbers of applicants for medical jobs, shortlisted candidates, and candidates offered positions. 

Twelve of the 18 trusts shared their full unredacted data with The BMJ on all grades of job applications. Across these 12 trusts, 29% (4675 of 15 853) of white applicants were shortlisted in 2020-21, compared with 13% (2041 of 15 515) of black applicants, 14% (8406 of 59 211) of Asian applicants, and 15% (1620 of 10 860) of applicants of mixed ethnicity.

Overall, 7% (1148) of white applicants were offered jobs, compared with 1% (188) of black applicants, 2% (1050) of Asian applicants, and 2% (188) of applicants of mixed ethnicity.

Cunliffe said that the findings were just one indicator of the barriers that applicants from ethnic minorities faced. “The racism some of these results point to will be replicated in the day-to-day lived experience of staff working within the trust,” she said. “NHSEI [NHS England and NHS Improvement] need to look at data in a more detailed way and, where needed, set out to trusts their clear expectations and targets for improvement.”

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Source: BMJ, 13 October 2021

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Charities say Covid booster rollout for immunosuppressed is ‘chaotic failure’

The programme of giving third Covid vaccinations to people with compromised immune systems has been a “chaotic failure”, charities have said, with fewer than half of those eligible contacted about a third jab before an NHS deadline this month.

Surveys by Blood Cancer UK and Kidney Care UK found that for both groups of patients, between 55% and 60% had yet to be invited to get a third injection, seen as particularly vital for conditions which affect people’s immune systems, as they are generally less protected by two jabs.

The charities said many of those who responded were desperately worried and were struggling to get information about a third vaccination. Some people with blood cancer had resorted to going to vaccination centres without an appointment, pleading for a third dose, Blood Cancer UK said.

Official figures show there were 45,066 confirmed new Covid cases in the UK on Thursday, the highest daily total since mid-July.

Kidney Care UK said the poor communication highlighted what seemed to be a “woeful lack of preparation” for the programme, the guidance for which was agreed on 2 September.

The third dose programme for people with compromised immune systems is separate to the wider rollout of booster jabs being offered to everyone over 50, and others with clinical vulnerabilities, which started on 15 September.

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Source: The Guardian, 15 October 2021

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Councillors call for NHS trust bosses to resign over maternity scandal

Senior managers at an NHS trust are facing calls to resign from local councillors after criticism of the trust’s culture and widespread bullying.

The chair of Nottinghamshire County Council's health scrutiny panel has called for the chair of Nottingham University Hospitals Trust Eric Morton to step down along with Keith Girling, the trust’s medical director.

Councillor Sue Saddington, chair of the council’s scrutiny committee, said she would be writing to health secretary Sajid Javid over concerns about leadership at the trust.

An investigation by The Independent and Channel 4 News earlier this year uncovered dozens of cases of negligent baby deaths and injuries costing millions of pounds in compensation. Families have accused the trust of trying to cover-up mistakes and not learning from errors.

More than 30 babies have died at the trust in the past decade with 46 children left with brain damage.

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Source: The Independent, 13 October 2021

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Dentist NHS targets can not be reached without putting patients and staff at risk

A patients' group says it is concerned over a lack of access to NHS dentists in South Gloucestershire after two surgeries turned private.

Frampton and Flaxpits surgeries say NHS targets can not be reached without putting patients and staff at risk. and they must go private to survive.

Vicky Marriott, of Healthwatch, an independent statutory body representing patients, said not having an option to have NHS care was a "real concern".

In a letter to patients, Dr Dimitri Haddjeri, dentist at Framptom and Flaxpits surgeries, said "target-driven, high-volume dentistry" was "not fit for purpose" and did not put the patient first.

He said NHS targets could not be reached without putting patients and staff at risk.

Ms Marriott said there were "enormous problems" for people trying to find NHS care across South Gloucestershire, Bristol and North Somerset.

"Between July and September this year, in Bristol alone, we've had 73 people contact us saying that they've been emailing or phoning every single dental practice to see if they can get treatment and haven't been able to," she said.

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Source: BBC News, 13 October 2021

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Plan to boost face-to-face GP consultations

GPs in England are being told to see more patients face-to-face as ministers unveil a £250m winter rescue package.

The emergency funding is being handed to GPs so they can recruit extra locum staff with an emphasis on providing more same-day appointments. Social distancing rules are also expected to be relaxed so that GPs can bring more people into their buildings. 

It comes amid mounting criticism about the fall in face-to-face appointments since the start of the pandemic.

Only 58% of patients were seen face-to-face in August - the first full month following the ending of restrictions. That compares with 54% in January and more than 80% before the pandemic.

Patients have also complained of long waits on phone lines to book an appointment.

The £250m funding is part of the extra £5bn Covid fund announced last month to help the NHS through to the end of the year, and comes on top of the £12bn set aside for GP services this year.

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Source: BBC News, 14 October 2021

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HEE tells trusts to prioritise training, or services will suffer

The quality and performance of services will suffer if medical training is not ‘prioritised and funded’ by trusts, Health Education England (HEE) has warned.

HEE has set out actions in its “Covid training recovery interim report” that must be done alongside NHS England, the Department of Health and Social Care and others to protect post-covid workforce recovery.

At the beginning of the pandemic, junior doctors’ training was severely disrupted because thousands of staff were redeployed to covid wards, while most routine elective operations and diagnostic procedures were stopped.

HEE says training has still not returned to pre-covid levels, and fears there could be further disruptions over winter if significant volumes of elective care are cancelled.

According to its report, if medical training is not “prioritised and funded”, the “long-term costs to service are significantly greater”.

“If delivery recovery is prioritised over training recovery there will be an initial increase in service delivery time and value, but this will be followed swiftly by a reduction in service delivery time and value,” it warned.

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Source: HSJ, 13 October 2021

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Hospitals trigger emergency measures as patients wait 13 hours in the back of ambulances

An NHS trust has spent more than two weeks running on emergency measures after skyrocketing demand since mid-September, while others have kept people waiting for more than a dozen hours in the backs of ambulances.

The Independent has learnt one patient in the West Midlands spent 13 hours waiting to be handed over to staff at the Shrewsbury and Telford Hospitals Trust.

Gloucester Hospitals Trust declared its internal incident on 19 September and only stood it down on 5 October, while London’s Barnet Hospital took similar extraordinary action on Monday due to high demand. And at North Middlesex Hospital staff saw more than 200 patients crowd into the emergency department on Monday afternoon.

Declaring an internal incident is designed to activate measures that help hospitals deal with a sudden peak of demand and should only last for a short time.

Such pressures are being felt across the country with NHS managers seriously concerned about what the coming months will look like as temperatures dip. One said they had not seen things as bad in more than a decade.

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Source: The Independent, 13 October 2021

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COVID-19: Government’s handling of pandemic had “big mistakes,” MPs say

The government’s actions in dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic have received a mixed review from MPs in a report that set out the successes and failures of the UK response.

Although the joint report from the House of Commons’ Science and Technology Committee and Health and Social Care Committee  praised the UK’s covid vaccination programme as highly effective, it also condemned serious errors, especially delayed lockdowns and how a test, trace, and isolate system was set up.

Overall, the MPs’ inquiry found that some government initiatives were examples of global best practice but that others represented “serious mistakes.” 

The UK’s pandemic planning was based too narrowly on a flu model that had failed to learn the lessons from the SARS, MERS, and Ebola epidemics, said the MPs, which meant that its covid planning was worse than in other countries.

Delays in establishing an adequate test, trace, and isolate system hampered efforts to contain the outbreak, said the MPs, and the government’s initial decision to delay a comprehensive lockdown had revealed its then “fatalistic” assumption that it was impossible to suppress the virus, which amounted, in practice, to accepting that herd immunity by infection was inevitable.

The report said that many thousands of deaths could have been avoided if the government had not let hospitals discharge people into care homes in the initial phase of the pandemic and that this showed the “longstanding failure” to give social care sufficient priority and the same attention as the NHS.

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Source: BMJ, 12 October 2021

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NHS faces beds crisis as care homes stop taking patients from hospitals

The NHS faces a mounting beds crisis as care homes suffering unprecedented staff shortages are forced to stop taking patients from hospitals, health and care leaders have warned.

Ministers are desperately trying to free up space in the NHS to tackle a backlog of 5.6 million people – equivalent to almost 10% of people in England – awaiting treatment.

But efforts to speed up the discharge of hospital patients into the community are being hampered by care worker shortages. Britain’s largest not-for-profit care home provider, MHA, has already had to close 1 in 10 of its homes to admissions from hospitals, its chief executive, Sam Monaghan, told the Guardian.

The warning comes as a comprehensive assessment on Wednesday reveals that care homes in England are facing the biggest staff shortage on record, with 105,000 positions unfilled according to the 2021 State of the Adult Social Care Sector and Workforce report by Skills for Care, an industry body.

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Source: The Guardian, 13 October 2021

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What those living with dementia want people to know

Across the UK, 850,000 people are living with dementia - and soon, if predictions are correct, there will be a million.

Some of them, and their families, share their tips with BBC News for living with the condition, how to talk to people with dementia and how they have learned to adjust to their changing brains.

Tommy Dunne, who has Alzheimer's disease, says: "If someone said to me, 'How would you communicate with a person with dementia?', I'd say the first thing you want to do is talk to the person, not the dementia. The second thing you want to do is get down to the person's level - if the person is sitting on the couch, don't stand over them and talk down, get down to the person's level, maintain eye contact. Speak in short sentences. Don't ask multiple questions at once - you know like, 'Who, what, why, where and when?' all in the one question - because we can't process that."

Marion says: "[dementia]... affects my vision and my spatial awareness. I have yellow painted on the doorframes - and that helps me so I know where I am. Everything was painted white before - and if everything is white, for me, I don't know where the door stops and the wall starts. The colour yellow stands out very well."

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Source: BBC News. 13 October 2021

Read our hub interview with dementia leads at Sussex Community NHS Foundation Trust on keeping patients with dementia safe.

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Northern Trust radiologist review finds 66 discrepancies

A review of the work of a former locum consultant radiologist in the Northern Trust has identified major discrepancies in 66 images.

The trust has concluded a review of 13,030 scans and x-rays. The review was launched in June after the General Medical Council raised concerns about the locum consultant radiologist's work.

The highest level of hospital investigation will be carried out into the cases of 17 patients.

More than 9,000 patients were contacted as part of the review.

The review identified six images at level one - a major discrepancy where errors or omissions in reporting could have had an immediate and significant clinical impact for the patients concerned. A further 60 images were level two - a major discrepancy with a probable clinical impact.

"Most of the images categorised as having Level 1 and Level 2 discrepancies are CT scans but some are MRI scans, chest x-rays and other x-rays," said the trust's medical director, Seamus O'Reilly.

"That detailed clinical assessment, which has resulted in 69 patients being called back, was to determine whether any clinical harm occurred as a result of the discrepancies found in the lookback review," 

"I can confirm that following careful consideration, the clinical assessment group has determined that 17 patients should now be part of a Level 3 Serious Adverse Incident (SAI) review."

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Source: BBC News, 13 October 2021

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Scotland records worst A&E waiting times performance yet

The percentage of patients visiting A&E who are seen within four hours has hit a “terrifying” new low in Scotland, latest figures show, with ministers urged to “get a grip” on the growing crisis.

The figure has been declining since the summer amid high demand, staffing shortages and a lack of patient flow through hospitals.

In the week to 3 October, just 71.3% of patients were seen within four hours, a five percentage point drop on the previous week, according to a data published by Public Health Scotland. The figure is the lowest since records began in 2015, with the Scottish Government target set at 95%.

With 25,000 visits to A&E in that week, it means more than 7,000 patients waited longer than four hours. Some 1,782 people waited more than eight hours, while a record 591 patients waited longer than 12 hours.

Last week, Scotland’s Health Secretary, Humza Yousaf, warned that Scotland’s NHS faces an “incredibly difficult winter” despite announcing a £300 million funding boost.

But opposition parties have now accused him of “overseeing a scandalous situation” and leaving A&E departments “beyond breaking point”.

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Source: The Scotsman, 12 October 2021

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One in four women under 40 have never checked themselves for breast cancer

One quarter of women under 40 have never checked themselves for breast cancer – believing they are too young, or they don’t think it will affect them, or they are just too busy.

And half of all women do not regularly check their breasts for signs of cancer.

The study of 2,000 women found those aged 18 to 39 are the least likely to look for signs of cancer, with a tenth believing they are not old enough to suffer the illness. But a quarter admit they do not have the confidence to inspect themselves, while 1 in 10 put it off in case they find a lump.

It also emerged women from South Asian backgrounds are the least likely to examine themselves compared to other ethnicities, with 40% admitting to never checking at all. This drops to 27% of black women and just 13% cent of those of other ethnicities.

Of the South Asian women polled who don’t check themselves for signs of breast cancer, more than a third said they forget or don’t know what they are looking for. While more than 1 in 20 (7%) don’t feel comfortable checking themselves due to cultural reasons.

Barriers to going to the doctor when noticing a lump or change in breasts vary – from not wanting to waste their doctor’s time, the fear of not being taken seriously, concerns that a female doctor won’t be available, and not wanting to know what caused the change.

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Source: The Independent, 11 October 2021

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Changes to be made to blood donations to become more inclusive

From the end of 2021, a question on sexual activity of partners in areas where HIV is widespread will be removed from the donor safety check form, in an effort to increase inclusivity among donors.

The changes will particularly improve the ease to donate blood for Black African donors.

Currently, prospective donors are asked if they have recently had sex with a partner who may ever have been sexually active in an area where HIV is endemic, which includes most of sub-Saharan Africa. If they have, the donor will then be deferred for three months after the last sexual contact with that partner. This can often mean Black African and other potential donors in long-term relationships have been unable to donate blood.

Now, the UK Government has outlined plans to remove the question from those asked in the donor safety check, opening the door to a greater number of donations.

Increasing blood donor inclusivity for those who are Black African, Black Caribbean, and of Black mixed ethnicity is particularly important because they are more likely to have the rare blood sub-group, such as Ro, that many Black sickle cell patients need.

The change, making it easier for people from these groups to donate, will create greater opportunities to meet the ongoing need for rarer blood types and help improve and save lives in the UK.

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Source: National Health Executive, 11 October 2021

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Covid response ‘one of UK’s worst ever public health failures’

Britain’s early handling of the coronavirus pandemic was one of the worst public health failures in UK history, with ministers and scientists taking a “fatalistic” approach that exacerbated the death toll, a landmark inquiry has found.

“Groupthink”, evidence of British exceptionalism and a deliberately “slow and gradualist” approach meant the UK fared “significantly worse” than other countries, according to the 151-page “Coronavirus: lessons learned to date” report led by two former Conservative ministers.

The crisis exposed “major deficiencies in the machinery of government”, with public bodies unable to share vital information and scientific advice impaired by a lack of transparency, input from international experts and meaningful challenge.

Despite being one of the first countries to develop a test for Covid in January 2020, the UK “squandered” its lead and “converted it into one of permanent crisis”. The consequences were profound, the report says. “For a country with a world-class expertise in data analysis, to face the biggest health crisis in 100 years with virtually no data to analyse was an almost unimaginable setback.”

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Source: The Guardian, 12 October 2021

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