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Complaint about ‘misleading’ NHS waiting times figures

Watchdogs have been asked to investigate a Scottish government overhaul of NHS waiting times information after surgeons said that some of the figures were “grossly misleading”.

A complaint has been made to the Office for Statistics Regulation, which ensures that important public data is trustworthy, about a new guide for patients on the NHS Inform website. Concerns have also been raised with Audit Scotland, which monitors public spending and NHS performance.

Last month Humza Yousaf, Scottish health secretary, unveiled the platform claiming that it would reassure patients about waiting times. But the times given reflect only the experience of patients treated over a three-month period.

In orthopaedics, surgeons say, only the most urgent cases are being prioritised while some patients face languishing on waiting lists for years due to lack of capacity.

NHS Inform says that people waited a median of 26 weeks between April and June for orthopaedic care, but surgeons argue that this gives a false impression. Dr Iain Kennedy, new chairman of the British Medical Association in Scotland, said the way the figures have been compiled would suggest that people are still not getting a realistic picture of delays.

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Source: The Times, 16 September 2022

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Compensation to be paid to family of patient who died from starvation

The family of a patient is to be paid a 6 figure sum after staff failed to realise she was malnourished and had intestinal failure, subsequently starving to death. 

The out-of-court settlement comes after Linda Doherty, 69, was found to have died from sepsis and acute kidney injury, malnutrition, intestinal failure secondary to Crohn’s disease and ileal resection, and inadequate nutritional intake. 

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Source: BMJ, 25 June 2021

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Comparing trusts on new productivity metric is misleading, experts warn

Recent productivity improvements will be hard to sustain in future years, experts have warned, as they said newly published NHS England data fails to show which trusts are the most productive.

The Department for Health and Social Care announced last month that productivity at acute and specialist trusts had grown by 2.7% in 2024-25 compared to the previous year – exceeding the 2% target set by government.

The productivity measure, which compares cost-weighted activity growth against real-terms resource growth to give a “productivity growth estimate”, is also one of three finance measures used to determine which segment of the NHS Oversight Framework providers are assigned.

The data, which compares 2023-24 with 2024-25, has last month published what effectively amounts to a productivity “league table”.

HSJ has learned some trusts, including two specialist providers which appeared to be the worst performers when the data was first published last month, have raised concerns to NHSE that their figures were inaccurate.

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Source: HSJ, 7 October 2025

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Community waiting list surges back above 1 million

The community services waiting list has risen sharply to more than 1 million, with children suffering the longest waits, new data has revealed.

NHS England figures published today show the adult community waiting list increased from 704,000 to 781,000 between October 2022 – the first published data available – and August. The children and young people’s list rose from 207,000 to 221,000. 

This means the overall community waiting list for England has exceeded 1 million for the first time since figures were first published in October last year.

Waits for musculoskeletal services dropped to a low of 255,000 in January. But this progress has since reversed – and, in July, the number of people waiting for care climbed to a high point of 319,000.

The waiting for podiatry and podiatric services, meanwhile, has climbed by 7% since October from 117,000 to 126,000, adding an extra 8,000 people to the waiting list. These services also account for 46 per cent – or 5,635 – of the waiting list over 52 weeks. 

Waiting lists for smaller adult specialties have also significantly worsened.

For example, nursing and therapy support for long-term conditions saw large increases in three areas: continence and colostomy, rising by 16%; respiratory and COPD, rising by 27%; and diabetes, rising by 37%.

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Source: HSJ, 12 October 2023

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Community services need new national funding bid, says outgoing NHS England director

The national clinical director for older people has announced he is leaving NHS England and said a major government funding settlement will be needed to maintain progress and take community services to the ‘next stage’.

Adrian Hayter joined NHSE in 2019 as NCD for older people and integrated person centred care.

Dr Hayter, who is also a longstanding GP partner in Berkshire, said community services were now much more prominent at NHSE — and in its asks of the service – than they were four years ago. 

He said: “When I first came in, there wasn’t very much in planning guidance about what was happening in the community at all. Now that is different and we are expecting a range of initiatives in 2024.

“But the future is that all of these things are not individual programmes - they’re all part of a particular approach to how we manage and support people for as long as possible in their own homes.

“Urgent community response [where services are required to respond within two-hours to urgent needs, referred from a range of services] and virtual wards are a continuum of care.

“And the growth of virtual wards have helped extend what happens in the community all the way through to the acute level care.”

National long-term funding for several of the new services – badged in the 2019 long-term plan as “Aging Well” – is also now due to end, with integrated care boards instead asked to commission them locally.

Dr Hayter warned that, as well as moving those services closer together, there needed to be a future government spending review settlement aimed at growing community services, to meet the needs of the rapidly ageing population.

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Source: HSJ, 18 December 2023

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Community pharmacists to expand role in patient care

Greater Manchester community pharmacies have signed up to a new national scheme, which will see patient consultations booked via NHS 111 for the very first time.

The scheme launched on the 29 October is part of major plans to boost the role of pharmacists in patient care, outlined in the national NHS Long Term Plan. People who call the free NHS 111 phone service can now be offered same day consultation with their local community pharmacist, if they need an urgent supply of a prescription medicine or advice on minor illnesses.

The aim of the scheme is to leverage pressure on GP practices and A&E departments, which come under increasing strain when the winter hits.

Early stages of the initiative in other parts of the country found that an estimated 6% of all GP consultations could be handled by a community pharmacist, freeing up around 20 million GP appointments each year nationally.

Sarah Price, Executive Lead for Population Health and Commissioning at Greater Manchester Health and Social Care Partnership said: “Our health services are facing unprecedented challenges and that means finding new ways to deliver the standard of care that patients expect, whilst ensuring that services are sustainable and fit for the future. Doing things the way we’ve always done, is no longer an option. Greater Manchester pharmacists are rising to the challenge and becoming more closely involved in patient care, often in close partnership with other health and care professionals." 

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Source: National Health Executive, 4 December 2019

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Community pharmacists speak out against rise in abuse and attacks

Pharmacists say physical and verbal abuse against them has become unacceptably common and many now feel unsafe when at work.

Police forces say they are being called out to handle pharmacy-based crimes.

The Pharmacists' Defence Association (PDA) says there have been reports of a stabbing and physical attacks in pharmacies around the UK and that more needs to be done to enforce the NHS's zero tolerance policy on worker abuse..

Pharmacist Conor McAreavey was stabbed in the hand with a knife at his pharmacy in Belfast in March. He told the BBC he was "very lucky" not to have suffered tendon damage.

Glasgow pharmacist Chand Kausar was threatened with a knife by an agitated patient, who - after demanding non-prescribed medication - produced a six-inch knife and cornered her against a wall.

"I just froze," explains Ms Kausar. "My hands were above my head and I could hear all the noise around me, but I actually felt very calm. In my head all was quiet. I remember thinking it was like a movie scene. I'd never seen a knife like that, and I never imagined I'd have one held to my throat."

The PDA launched an online survey in April 2022 and nearly 550 community pharmacists, mostly staff working in England, have responded so far.

Some 468 of them - 85% - say they, or someone they work with, experienced verbal or racial abuse in the previous month while at work.

One respondent said: "I feel terrified going to work every single day, and yet management are ignoring the issue."

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Source: BBC News, 6 June 2022

 

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Community nursing faces ‘rehabilitation disaster’ as Covid leaves thousands in need

Tens of thousands of coronavirus survivors needing long-term care are heaping pressure on Britain’s stretched community services, threatening a crisis that experts warn could dwarf that seen in hospitals over the past 12 months.

As many as 100,000 intensive care patients, including up to 15,000 Covid-19 survivors, will need long-term community nursing care after being discharged from hospitals during the past 12 months, The Independent has been told.

This will be on top of an as yet unknown number of Covid patients from the 350,000 treated on general wards since the pandemic began, as well as tens of thousands of people who were sick without going to hospital but have been left with debilitating symptoms of long Covid.

Labour’s shadow health minister Liz Kendall warned: “There will be huge pressures on community services as people who need long-term support are discharged back into their own homes.

“Ministers have got to put in place a proper workforce strategy for the NHS and community care otherwise we will see people struggling to recover and the burden of care could also fall on their families."

“This is one of the long-term consequences of Covid that we haven’t begun to even think through yet.”

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Source: The Independent, 14 February 2021

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Communities to benefit from health centres on their doorstep

Tens of thousands of patients in England will benefit from improved healthcare on their doorstep, as the government rolls out the first 27 neighbourhood health centres – bringing more services into the community.

Once completed, patients will immediately be able to access a greater range of health services from these centres - all under one roof and closer to their homes - including include urgent treatment, GP and pharmacy services.

The 27 will be open by 2027 and are the first of 50 neighbourhood health centres backed by a total of £200 million in government investment to upgrade existing buildings.

In total the government has pledged to open 250 by 2036, with the first 120 open by 2030.

Neighbourhood health services will benefit patients by providing end-to-end care and tailored support, looking beyond the condition at wider causes of health issues to the specific individual, helping avoid unnecessary trips to hospital, prevent complications and end the frustration of being passed around the system. This will have particular benefits for people with complex conditions, such as those at the end of their lives.

A range of services under one roof will mean more conditions can be treated swiftly locally - allowing people to talk through their health conditions as well as their lifestyle and quality of life and any other relevant contributing factors, enabling a rapid referral to the appropriate care and support where this is needed.

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Source: Department of Health and Social Care, 26 March 2026

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Communication, resolution and apology programs gain momentum

A new patient safety measure from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services brings renewed attention to the value of using a communication and resolution approach to meet the needs of patients and families after harm events. 

Acceptance of this approach has reached a “tipping point,” according to Melinda Van Niel, M.B.A., Betsy Lehman Center’s Program Director for CARe, which stands for Communication, Apology and Resolution. 

Communication and resolution programs (CRPs) such as CARe are expected to draw additional interest in Massachusetts and across the country, Van Niel says, after new expectations were set in a patient safety structural measure from CMS asking hospitals to attest to their investment in an “evidence-based communication and resolution program.”

CARe includes the elements CMS says should be part of a CRP: open and ongoing communication with patients and families; harm event investigation, prevention, and learning; clinician support; and appropriate resolution (financial and non-financial) for patients and families, she notes.

“In Massachusetts, CARe has reached a tipping point,” says Van Niel. “Most organizations know and accept that this is what they should do when something has gone wrong in a patient’s care,” she says.  “The next question is, ‘How do we do it?’” 

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Source: Betsy Lehman Center, 18 September 2024

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Commonly-prescribed supplements ‘have no effect’ in preventing fractures in elderly people, review finds

Calcium and vitamin D supplements are ineffective at preventing falls and fractures in older people, a review has concluded.

Despite their common prescription on the NHS for those at risk of osteoporosis or fracture, and widespread public use for bone health, the comprehensive study found no evidence to support their regular intake specifically for this preventative measure.

Published in the British Medical Journal, the research, led by academics in Quebec, Canada, meticulously analysed 69 clinical trials encompassing 153,902 individuals.

Their investigation delved into the risk of any fracture, hip fractures, bone breaks occurring outside the spine, spinal fractures, and the overall frequency of falls.

The results showed that there was “little to no effect” on the risk of any fracture from taking calcium supplements, vitamin D supplements or both of them combined.

The team said almost a third of people aged 65 and over experience at least one fall every year.

“As much as 85% of older adults have a fear of falling because of a fall, contributing to reduced daily functioning and increased risk of subsequent falls,” they added.

“Furthermore, half of women and one fifth of men will sustain a low trauma fracture during their lifetime, often due to a fall.”

They acknowledged some of the trials were small and had few people, and said the results may not apply to people with specific bone disorders or to those receiving drug treatment for osteoporosis.

However, they concluded their findings “do not support routine supplementation with calcium or vitamin D, or combined supplementation to prevent fractures and falls” and they suggested doctors, guideline panels and regulatory agencies “should re-evaluate their general recommendations for calcium and vitamin D supplementation in light of current evidence.”

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Source: The Independent, 20 May 2026

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Common allergy medication’s risks outweigh its usefulness, experts say (CNN)

Dr. Anna Wolfson says she sees dangerous misuse of the allergy medication diphenhydramine in her clinic every day.

“If someone has an allergic reaction to a food, people will say, ‘Don’t worry, I have diphenhydramine in my purse,’ and I would say, ‘Really, epinephrine is the first-line treatment for food allergies,’” said Wolfson, an allergist at Massachusetts General Hospital.

Diphenhydramine can be harmful if people take it after having an allergic reaction to food, she said, because the drug – best known by the brand name Benadryl – makes them drowsy and can cause them to miss signs that their symptoms are getting worse.

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Source: CNN, 1 August 2025

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Colorectal A&G pathway has been ‘barrier’ to cancer diagnoses, GPs warn

GPs have raised concern about a new colorectal cancer pathway aimed at reducing referrals into one of England’s largest acute hospital trusts.

The pathway was implemented in December 2022 to tackle long waiting lists at United Lincolnshire Hospitals Trust (ULHT) by reducing the number of referrals from primary care. 

But the Lincolnshire LMC and Primary Care Network Association both raised concerns about the pathway and its impact on general practice in a letter to their ICB earlier this month.

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Source: Pulse, 13 February 

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Colorado surgeon guilty of manslaughter in teen patient's death after breast augmentation

A Colorado surgeon has been convicted of manslaughter in the death of a teenage patient who went into a coma during breast augmentation surgery and died a year later.

Emmalyn Nguyen, who was 18 when she underwent the procedure 1 August 2019, at Colorado Aesthetic and Plastic Surgery in Greenfield Village, near Denver, fell into a coma and went into cardiac arrest after she received anaesthesia, officials said.

She died at a nursing home in October 2020.

Dr. Geoffrey Kim, 54, a plastic surgeon, was found guilty of attempted reckless manslaughter and obstruction of telephone service.

At Kim’s trial, a nurse anesthetist testified that he advised Kim that the patient needed immediate medical attention in a hospital setting and that 911 should be called, prosecutors said.

An investigation determined Kim failed to call for help for five hours after the patient went into cardiac arrest, prosecutors said. The obstruction charge was linked to testimony that multiple medical professionals, including two nurses, requested permission to call 911 to transfer care for Nguyen, but Kim, the owner of the surgery centre, denied the request, prosecutors said.

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Source: ABC News, 15 June 2023

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College chiefs demand NHS workforce plan inquiry is reopened

Royal college chiefs have called for an inquiry into the NHS long-term workforce plan to be reopened amid “significant concerns” over its projections.

Seven colleges led by the Royal College of GPs have written to the Commons’ public accounts committee asking it to restart its probe into the workforce plan’s modelling, which began earlier this year but then halted ahead of July’s general election.

It comes after the National Audit Office found “significant weaknesses” in the workforce plan’s projections, such as the number of fully qualified GPs. HSJ has previously revealed GP numbers will barely increase under the national workforce plan.

NHSE has previously said the long-term workforce plan “is based on credible and robust modelling”, which was independently assessed by the Health Foundation think tank.

A letter to new PAC chair Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown, which has been signed by the Royal College of Nursing and the Royal College of Physicians among other bodies, said: “During the inquiry, written evidence submissions reflected significant concerns and recommendations regarding certain aspects of the LTWP.

“However, the general election halted this process, and the inquiry was closed before it was concluded. We are therefore calling on the committee to re-open its inquiry into the LTWP.”

The letter, shared with HSJ, called for the findings of the reopened inquiry to be published ahead of the workforce plan’s next iteration in summer 2025.

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Source: HSJ, 25 October 2024

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Collective intelligence can help reduce medical misdiagnoses

An estimated 250,000 people die from preventable medical errors in the U.S. each year. Many of these errors originate during the diagnostic process. A powerful way to increase diagnostic accuracy is to combine the diagnoses of multiple diagnosticians into a collective solution. However, there has been a dearth of methods for aggregating independent diagnoses in general medical diagnostics.

Researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Human Development, the Institute for Cognitive Sciences and Technologies (ISTC), and the Norwegian University of Science and Technology have therefore introduced a fully automated solution using knowledge engineering methods.

The researchers tested their solution on 1,333 medical cases provided by The Human Diagnosis Project (Human Dx), each of which was independently diagnosed by 10 diagnosticians. The collective solution substantially increased diagnostic accuracy: Single diagnosticians achieved 46% accuracy, whereas pooling the decisions of 10 diagnosticians increased accuracy to 76%. Improvements occurred across medical specialties, chief complaints, and diagnosticians’ tenure levels.

"Our results show the life-saving potential of tapping into the collective intelligence," says first author Ralf Kurvers. He is a senior research scientist at the Center for Adaptive Rationality of the Max Planck Institute for Human Development and his research focuses on social and collective decision making in humans and animals.

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Source: Digital Health News, 2 November 2023

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Collapse of social care could force more elderly people out of their own homes

Elderly and vulnerable people could be forced to move out of their own homes into institutional care unless the chancellor invests billions of pounds to shore up social services and reform England’s broken care model, The Independent has been told.

In an exclusive interview ahead of Rishi Sunak’s Budget on Wednesday, James Bullion, president of the Association of Directors of Adult Social Services (ADASS), warned the care system risked “catastrophic failure in some areas” without urgent changes to the way vulnerable people, including younger disabled people, are looked after.

He warned the number of people needing care had doubled in some parts of the country since March, as a result of the coronavirus pandemic.

Ministers are planning to bring forward reforms to social care later this year, but Mr Bullion, who leads social services in Norfolk, said the system needed at least £4bn over the next two years “just to keep the show on the road”.

He warned the sector had been rocked by more than 30,000 deaths in care homes from Covid, with a 40% turnover in staff, higher sickness, and more than 100,000 vacancies on top of rising costs.

“We’ve got social care providers who are very much more fragile and at risk than they were a year ago. We were able to pay premiums to providers to keep going, but we've now reached the point where the revenue consequences of the last year will come home to roost. And we're very worried about the impact on the social care market and whether it will still be there for us in a way that it’s been in the past year if we take that support away.”

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Source: The Independent, 1 March 2021

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Cold homes will cost children’s lives and cause long-term damage, warn experts

Cold homes will damage children’s lungs and brain development and lead to deaths as part of a “significant humanitarian crisis” this winter, health experts have warned.

Unless the next prime minister curbs soaring fuel bills, children face a wave of respiratory illness with long-term consequences, according to a review by Sir Michael Marmot, the director of University College London’s Institute of Health Equity, and Prof Ian Sinha, a respiratory consultant at Liverpool’s Alder Hey children’s hospital.

Sinha said he had “no doubt” that cold homes would cost children’s lives this winter, although they could not predict how many, with damage done to young lungs leading to chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), emphysema and bronchitis for others in adulthood.

Huge numbers of cash-strapped households are preparing to turn heating systems down or off when the energy price cap increases to £3,549 from 1 October, and the president of the British Paediatric Respiratory Society, also told the Guardian that child deaths were likely.

“There will be excess deaths among some children where families are forced into not being able to heat their homes,” said Dr Simon Langton-Hewer. “It will be dangerous, I’m afraid.”

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Source: The Guardian, 1 September 2022

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Colchester nurse struck off for withholding morphine from brain tumour patient for being 'lazy'

A care home nurse has been struck off after he gave a brain tumour patient sugar and water instead of pain relief.

Vijayan Rajoo said he felt the patient was "just being lazy" and did not need pain relief.

Rajoo, 64, also failed to check supplies in the controlled drug cupboards at the start and end of his shifts, according to a misconduct panel.

He was struck off for 18 months after a deputy manager at the home, St Fillans in Colchester, Essex, discovered 20ml of liquid morphine Oramorph was unaccounted for in June 2019.

Rajoo later confessed to not giving the brain tumour patient a dose of Oramorph as a form of pain relief as he felt the patient "did not need it".

It was reported the patient could immediately tell the sugar and water mix "didn't taste right".

The misconduct panel found all charges against Rajoo proven. In their conclusions, the panel said Rajoo showed a "serious lack of compassion".

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Source: ITV News, 13 August 2022

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Coffey’s ‘ultra-libertarian’ health stance risks lives, Tory ex-minister warns

People could die because of Thérèse Coffey’s “ultra-libertarian ideological” reluctance to crack down on smoking and obesity, a Conservative ex-health minister has warned.

The strongly worded criticism of the health secretary came from Dr Dan Poulter, a Tory MP and NHS doctor who served as a health minister in the coalition government from 2012 to 2015.

Poulter claims Coffey’s “hostility to what the extreme right call ‘nanny statism’” is stopping her from taking firm action against the “major killers” of tobacco and bad diet.

His intervention – in an opinion piece for the Guardian – was prompted by Coffey making clear that she opposed banning adults from smoking in cars containing children, even though the practice was outlawed in 2015 and is credited with reducing young people’s exposure to secondhand smoke.

The government’s widely anticipated scrapping of measures to curb obesity such as the sugar tax and ditching of the tobacco control plan and health inequalities white paper – both of which previous health ministers had promised to publish – have led Poulter to brand Coffey’s stance “deeply alarming”.

He writes: “More smoking and more obesity means more illness, more pressure on the NHS and shorter lives, particularly amongst the poorest in society.

“I am acutely concerned that the health secretary’s ideological hostility to what history shows is government’s potentially very positive role in protecting us against these grave threats to our health will exacerbate the problems they already pose.

“At its worst such a radically different approach to public health could cost lives, as it will inevitably lead to more people smoking and becoming dangerously overweight.”

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Source: The Guardian, 18 October 2022

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Coffey warned of ‘significant risk’ posed by CQC restructuring

Staff at the Care Quality Commission (CQC) have been left ‘in fear of speaking out’ against structural changes to the organisation which they believe ‘pose a significant risk’ to the CQC’s ability to regulate health services, trade unions have told the health and social care secretary.

A letter signed by senior officers of Unison, Royal College of Nursing, Unite, Prospect and the Public and Commercial Services union has called on Therese Coffey to urge the CQC to pause its organisational change and enter into “meaningful discussions” with the unions.

The unions have raised concerns that organisational changes to the CQC have been drawn up by consultants with no frontline experience in health and social care, or in regulation, and that staff have had limited input into the changes.

They allege that staff raising concerns about the changes have been dismissed as being “disruptive” or “negative”, and significant numbers of experienced staff have recently left the regulator.

The CQC said in response to the letter that the changes it was proposing were needed to enable the regulator to “work more effectively across the health and care system”, and that it has engaged with trade unions throughout the process.

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Source: HSJ. 23 September 2022

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Coffey promises ‘absolutely no changes to four-hour A&E target’

Therese Coffey has pledged there will be no changes to the four-hour target for A&E waiting times – despite NHS England’s prolonged bid to axe the controversial measure.

The new health and social care secretary told the House of Commons Thursday: “I can absolutely say there will be no changes to the target for four-hour waits in A&E.”

Ms Coffey’s comments appear to represent a major blow to NHS England, which has since 2019 been pushing for a new bundle of metrics to replace the target.

Fourteen trusts have been trialling these, which include measures such as average time spent in an emergency department and 12-hour waits from time of arrival, as part of the Clinical Review of Standards.

NHSE had also, after a protracted battle, secured the support of key stakeholders, including the Royal College of Emergency Medicine, NHS Providers and Heathwatch England, to back its plans to ditch the target, for so long the NHS’s most significant performance metric.

The bold position – with Ms Coffey just weeks into the role – also contradicts the stance taken by both recent predecessors Sajid Javid and Matt Hancock, who both signalled they were supportive of scrapping the target. 

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Source: HSJ, 22 September 2022

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Coffey accused of leaving NHS 'in limbo' on A&E target

The four-hour emergency care target is “not the right answer” long term, but services have been left “in limbo” by Therese Coffey’s promise that it will no longer be scrapped, the president of the Royal College of Emergency Medicine has said.

Katherine Henderson said RCEM was “delighted” there could be more focus on the four-hour target in the short term following the health and social care secretary’s surprise comment last week, as emergency care has been “in a performance policy vacuum since before the pandemic”.

But Dr Henderson said that in the long term there should be performance metrics that account for the “journey” of the most acutely unwell patients, and should be a further review of NHS England’s clinical review of standards – which proposed a suite of new measures to replace the totemic four-hour target. She added that more than a dozen A&Es which are involved in trialling the new measures have been “left in limbo”.

Dr Henderson, whose term as RCEM president ends in October, said plans to use virtual wards and urgent community response teams to improve patient flow and prevent emergency admissions would have limited impact this winter due to a lack of staff.

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Source: HSJ, 26 September 2022

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Coeliac UK calls for change following death of coeliac patient in hospital

A North Wales coroner has concluded there was a ‘gross failure’ in the case of a coeliac patient, who tragically died in Wrexham Maelor hospital.

Mrs Hazel Pearson, 79, had coeliac disease and a number of other medical conditions and died from aspiration pneumonia four days after being given Weetabix for breakfast while at the hospital.

Whilst her coeliac disease was noted on her admission records, there was no sign above her bed and staff were unaware of her dietary needs and as a result Mrs Pearson had been fed gluten containing food on multiple occasions.  

Tristan Humphreys, Head of Advocacy for Coeliac UK said: 

“We are deeply saddened and concerned by this verdict and our thoughts go out to Mrs Pearson’s loved ones at this very difficult time. Her death reflects a clear failure of care and it is patently unacceptable that this was allowed to happen. Coeliac disease is a serious autoimmune condition for which the only treatment is a medically prescribed gluten free diet. It is critical that people with coeliac disease can access the gluten free food they need to be healthy. This is all the more important when someone is unwell and, as in Mrs Pearson’s tragic case, unable to advocate for themselves. Wales has mandatory food standards which make very clear the level of care that should be provided yet these have not been met. As a charity, we are empowering patients, family members, carers and working with hospital caterers by providing advice and guidance to support safe provision of gluten free food. However, it’s high time the health service consistently delivered the care people with coeliac disease deserve.” 

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Source: Coeliac UK, 24 November 2023

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Coeliac patient died after being fed Weetabix in hospital, inquiry hears

An 80-year-old woman with coeliac disease died within days of being fed Weetabix in hospital, an inquest has heard.

Hazel Pearson, from Connah’s Quay in Flintshire, was being treated at Wrexham Maelor hospital and died four days later on 30 November from aspiration pneumonia. Although her condition was recorded on her admission documents, there was no sign beside her bed to alert healthcare assistants to her dietary requirements.

Coeliac disease is a condition where the immune system attacks the body’s own tissues after consuming gluten, a type of protein found in wheat, rye and barley, causing damage to the small intestine.

The hospital’s action plan to avoid similar fatal incidents lacked detail and had “narrow vision”, the coroner said.

The hospital’s matron, Jackie Evans, told the inquest that changes, including placing signs above the beds of patients with special dietary requirements, had been implemented since Pearson’s death. But Sutherland raised concerns that the hospital had yet to carry out a formal investigation into what went wrong.

She said: “The action plan lacks detail. What has happened locally is commendable, but it lacks detail and it has narrow vision.” She added that the plan that had been put in place was “amateurish with no strategic vision”.

The assistant coroner said she would be unable to make a decision on a prevention of future deaths report until the Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board (BCUHB) provided a witness to answer further questions about changes.

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Source: The Guardian, 17 June 2022

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