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‘Rolls-Royce’ EPR still being driven ‘like a Ford Focus’ admits trust CEO

The chief executive of an acute trust operating in one of the country’s most troubled healthcare economies has admitted his organisation is struggling to get the most from its top of the range electronic patient record system three years after rollout. 

Royal Devon University Healthcare Foundation Trust implemented the Epic EPR in October 2020, but the system is still causing problems with reporting performance. 

In an interview with HSJ, chief executive Sam Higginson described Epic as a “Rolls-Royce of an EPR”, but he added: “For lots of different reasons we’re still driving it a little bit like it’s a Ford Focus.

He added: “We assumed by installing an EPR that basically it would have a sufficient level of functionality that we could switch off pretty much everything else. But then you find actually it doesn’t quite have the functionality you thought it did, or you don’t quite know how to use it.”

However, Mr Higginson said the trust’s use of the EPR was improving “every month”, and the trust is testing a new cancer reporting module which it hopes will resolve the reporting problems.

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Source: HSJ, 21 May 2024

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‘Robustly manage’ staff who ‘lack compassion and openness’, NHSE tells trusts

Trust chief executives have been told to “robustly manage” staff who repeatedly “demonstrate a lack of compassion or openness” over failings in maternity care.

It comes after health and social care secretary Wes Streeting announced a rapid investigation into failings at 10 trusts.

NHSE CEO Sir Jim Mackey and chief nursing officer Duncan Burton have written to trust leaders, saying: “We can’t accept the status quo.” The letter warns of “challenging conversations” to come with leaders in some organisations.

It does not provide examples of what “robust” management would involve. It says every trust with responsibilities for maternity and neonatal care needs to:

  • Be rigorous in tackling poor behaviour and culture by addressing examples of this without delay;
  • Listen directly to families who have experienced harm when concerns are raised or identified while also creating the conditions for staff to speak up;
  • Retain a “laser focus” on tackling inequalities, discrimination and racism within services. It promises a “new anti-discrimination programme” from August to support leadership teams to improve culture and practice. Trusts should also accelerate plan to provide enhanced continuity of care for those in the most deprived neighbourhoods; and
  • Review its approach to reviewing data on maternity and neonatal services, monitoring outcomes and experience.

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Source: HSJ, 24 June 2025

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‘Robot paramedics’ carry out chest compressions on patients in ambulances

A robot paramedic is to be used for the first time to carry out chest compressions on ambulance patients to free up the emergency team who can perform other vital treatments.

The device is known as LUCAS 3 and is able to deliver consistent, high-quality CPR chest compressions whilst the patient is on their journey to hospital. CPR is essential to maintaining oxygen levels in the body and flow of blood when someone is no longer breathing.

South Central Ambulance Service (SCAS) is the first ambulance service in the country to use the robots, which cost about £12,000.

An SCAS spokesman said: “Once paramedics arrive and begin CPR or take over from bystanders who may have initiated it, the transition from manual compressions to LUCAS can be completed within seven seconds, ensuring continuity of compressions.”

Data of the event can also be collected which can be reviewed at a later date.

Dr John Black, medical director at SCAS, said: “We know that delivering high quality and uninterrupted chest compressions in cardiac arrest is one of the major determinants of survival to hospital discharge but it can be very challenging for a number of reasons.

“People can become fatigued when performing CPR manually which then affects the rate and quality of compressions, and patients may need to be moved from difficult locations, such as down a narrow flight of stairs, or remote places which impedes the process.”

Dr Black went on to explain that these devices don’t “fatigue or change” their delivery as a human might. This means “high quality CPR can be delivered for as long as is required.”

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Source: The Independent, 22 May 2020

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‘Risk of future deaths’: coroner issues rare warning to health secretary over hospitals crisis

A coroner has urged the health secretary to take action to prevent needless deaths after a woman died of heart failure following a four-hour wait in the back of an ambulance.

Lyn Brind, 61, was taken to the Queen Elizabeth Hospital (QEH) in King’s Lynn, Norfolk, with chest pains and low blood oxygen levels but could not be admitted because the hospital had “no space”. Instead she remained in a queue of ambulances outside A&E without a timely diagnosis or treatment and where warning signs about her condition were missed.

It was only after four hours and 25 minutes of waiting that she was transferred to a ward, by which time she was “agitated and short of breath”. She was placed on life support but died 22 minutes later.

Brind’s family believe the grandmother of four, a former dinner lady from the town, “might still be alive today” had she been admitted more swiftly. “She wasn’t given a chance,” her partner of 38 years, Richard Bunton, said.

After an inquest earlier this month into Brind’s death in May 2022, the senior coroner for Norfolk, Jacqueline Lake, took the unusual step of writing to England’s health secretary, Steve Barclay, to raise concerns about the NHS and social care.

She warned that others could die in similar circumstances unless action was taken. “I believe you have the power to take such action,” Lake wrote in a prevention of future deaths report.

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Source: The Guardian, 29 January 2023

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‘Risk averse’ NHS 111 algorithm sends too many patients to A&E

NHS 111 sends too many people to accident and emergency departments because its computer algorithm is “too risk averse”, the country’s top emergency doctor has warned.

Dr Adrian Boyle, president of the Royal College of Emergency Medicine (RCEM), said that December was the “worst ever” in A&E with 9 in 10 emergency care leaders reporting to the RCEM that patients were waiting more than 24 hours in their departments.

Asked what measures could help improve pressures in emergency care, Dr Boyle said more clinical input was needed in NHS 111 calls.

“In terms of how we manage people who could be looked after elsewhere, the key thing to do is to improve NHS 111,” Dr Boyle told MPs.

“There is a lack of clinical validation and a lack of clinical access within NHS 111 - 50 per cent of calls have some form of clinical input, there’s an awful lot which are just people following an algorithm.”

Dr Boyle added where clinical input is lacking “it necessarily becomes risk averse and sends too many people to their GP, ambulance or emergency department”.

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Source: The Telegraph, 24 January 2023

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‘Ridiculous’ cuts to AI cancer tech funding in England could cost lives, experts warn

Ministers have cut millions of pounds of funding for potentially life saving AI cancer technology in England, which cancer experts warn will increase waiting times and could cause more patients to die.

Contouring is used in radiotherapy to ensure treatment is as effective and safe as possible. The tumour and normal tissue is “mapped” or contoured on to medical scans, to ensure the radiation targets the cancer while minimising damage to healthy tissues and organs.

Normally, this is a slow, manual process that can take doctors between 20 and 150 minutes to complete. AI auto-contouring takes less than five minutes and costs around £10-£15 per patient.

Research shows that AI contouring can cut waits for radiotherapy by more than five days for breast cancer patients, up to nine days for prostate cancer patients and three days for lung cancer patients.

In May 2024, the Conservative government announced £15.5m over three years to fund AI auto-contouring for all hospitals providing radiotherapy. Work continued on the scheme after the general election, with online webinars and follow-up calls for radiotherapy departments held in September.

The 51 trusts offering radiotherapy continued to work on installing the cloud-based technology, with a number using it early, in the belief the funding was secured.

But in February, in an email seen by the Guardian, Nicola McCulloch, the deputy director of specialised commissioning at NHS England, said the funding had been cancelled “due to a need to further prioritise limited investment”. There would no longer be a centrally funded programme to support implementation of the technology, she said.

The decision means many radiotherapy departments face a return to manual contouring, prompting accusations that the government is ditching digital and going back to analogue cancer care.

Analysis by Radiotherapy UK has calculated that removing funding for AI contouring in England will add up to 500,000 extra days to waiting lists for breast, prostate and lung cancer alone and leave each of the 51 trusts with a £300,000 shortfall.

The chair of Radiotherapy UK, Prof Pat Price, said: “The government cannot laud the advent of AI in one breath, and allow this to happen. Far from moving from an analogue to digital NHS, when it comes to radiotherapy it feels like the opposite is happening. This wrong-footed decision will exacerbate the impact of severe staff shortages.”

The leading oncologist urged ministers to intervene. “Some departments are so short-handed that they’re shutting machines down because no one is there to operate them and nationally, radiotherapy vacancy rates are running at 8%. This investment in AI could have alleviated some of these pressures. Without it, cancer patients will wait longer than necessary for treatment, potentially costing their lives.”

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Source: The Guardian, 31 March 2025

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‘Revolutionary’ DNA blood test to offer thousands in England tailored cancer care

Thousands of cancer patients in England are to benefit from a DNA blood test that saves lives by fast-tracking them on to personalised treatments.

In a world-first, the NHS will offer patients with lung and breast cancer – two of the most common forms of the disease – a liquid biopsy that detects tiny fragments of tumour DNA.

Rapid results from the groundbreaking test mean patients can immediately be offered drugs and treatments specifically tailored to the genetic profile of their disease, significantly increasing their survival chances and paving the way for a new era of precision medicine.

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Source: The Guardian, 29 May 2025

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‘Restoration’ of non-covid NHS services gets under way

The government has announced that the “restoration of other NHS services” will start today on a “hospital-by-hospital” basis.

Health and social care secretary Matt Hancock in his daily ministerial coronavirus briefing announced the resumption of healthcare which has been suspended due to coronavirus will begin today. He said the initial focus would be on the most urgent services, citing cancer and mental health as examples.

They will be reintroduced on a locally decided basis, depending on the level the virus is currently impacting different areas and trusts, which varies widely, and how easily they can reintroduce the work, he said.

Mr Hancock, asked about the plan by HSJ during the briefing, indicated that a large-scale return would be enabled because the government is setting out to avoid a so-called second peak of the virus spreading, so the NHS will not need to keep tens of thousands of extra beds free in readiness. Experts and governments around the globe are concerned about the prospect of further peaks of the virus spread as they move to release distancing measures. 

Further NHS England guidance on the plan is expected later this week. 

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Source: HSJ, 27 April 2020

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‘Resentment’ uncovered in ‘inadequate’ children’s unit

Inspectors have branded a hospital’s paediatric services “inadequate” and warned of “resentment” among medical staff following a trust merger.

Yeovil District Hospital – which recently closed its birthing unit after admitting it “cannot safely run” the service – has seen its paediatric services downgraded from “good” to “inadequate” following a Care Quality Commission inspection that took place in January.

The inspection report into YDH’s children’s and young people’s services, released today, described a lack of experienced staff and inadequate learning from serious incidents.

It also described a “level of resentment” among some medical staff following YDH’s merger with Somerset Foundation Trust in April 2023, which had prevented a “culture of continuous improvement”.

Last month, Somerset FT temporarily closed the special care baby unit and inpatient maternity services at YDH for at least six months after receiving a warning notice from the CQC in January about significant gaps in medical staffing.

The report said: “There was a level of resentment felt by some medical staff. Some staff told us the key leadership roles had been appointed and therefore felt new ways of working had been imposed upon them. There was not a culture of continuous improvement.”

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‘Real nastiness’: therapist training courses in UK can be ‘toxic’ and need regulating, say students

When Sally Mumford enrolled in a training course to become a psychotherapist in 2020, she was excited to start a new career.

She hoped to help people understand how their feelings and behaviour were shaped by their pasts. But she quickly realised that the course might not be what she had expected. “I arrived like a lamb to the slaughter,” she said. “There was a real nastiness that percolated down from the top.”

Mumford said her tutors at the training centre in London let bullying between students go unchecked. “It was all part of making you into a therapist. The whole ethos was to break you down and build you back up how they wanted you to be.”

Mumford is one of more than a dozen people who have studied for psychotherapy qualifications at UK institutions who told the Observer that some courses cross the line from challenging to toxic, with tutors bullying students. Some said their tutors made humiliating remarks to them in public, and left them feeling too scared to speak up or leave the course.

But the industry is largely unregulated; “psychotherapist” is not a protected profession, so anyone can set up a practice with that title.

Psychotherapist training is also unregulated, and there is a wide range of qualifications across the UK. 

Amanda Williamson, a psychotherapist who has been campaigning for regulation in the industry for more than a decade, is concerned about “toxic” training courses. “I’ve heard negative feedback about all manner of courses at prominent universities, including appalling tales of bullying and badly-run ‘group process’,” Williamson said.

Since psychotherapy training requires students to be vulnerable, she argues, regulations must be more rigorous than in other industries. Therapists and training institutions should be bound by a consistent code of ethics, and regulated by the same body, she said. “Regulation, or at least an inquiry to shine a light on these toxic hotspots that are allowed to fester … is very much overdue.”

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Source: The Guardian, 17 November 2024

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‘Rapid’ assessment launched to help NHS organisations pick new tech

NHSX has launched a ‘simpler and faster’ technology assessment process to help healthcare providers pick digital tools that meet NHS standards.

The new digital technology assessment criteria provides NHS and social care teams with guidance to decide which tools to use or to recommend to patients. NHS organisations, national bodies and social care will be encouraged to apply the DTAC when considering any form of digital health technology procurement.

NHSX described DTAC as “a new simpler and faster assessment process to help give staff, patients and the public confidence that the digital health tools they use meet NHS standards”, adding it “is a rapid process that can be completed in days”.

It has previously taken as long as two months for tools to go through assessment processes. 

The guidance brings together legislation and best practice across five areas. Tools will receive a pass or fail score in the first four categories — clinical safety, data protection, technical security and interoperability — and an additional percentage score for usability and accessibility. 

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Source: HSJ, 23 February 2021

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‘Racist and misogynistic’ behaviour called out by regulator

A teaching trust has been warned it could see resident doctors removed unless it addresses a raft of concerns, including racist and misogynistic behaviour.

The General Medical Council has placed conditions on Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital Foundation Trust following a period of “enhanced monitoring”.

The concerns cover the trust’s medicine and surgical departments, and involve all grades of resident doctors (formerly known as junior doctors).

The trust said it was taking the issues “very seriously” and is “resolved to make this a great place to work, train and develop”.

The medical regulator’s director for education and standards Professor Colin Melville said: “Despite ongoing work with the trust for two years, doctors in training in these departments continue to report a range of concerns, including racist and misogynistic behaviours, which need to be addressed as a priority.

“There are also concerns around the clinical supervision of doctors in training, handover processes and access to educational opportunities.”

The trust was told to adequately cover rotas, and make sure trainees were not subjected to “behaviours including racist and misogynistic behaviours”. 

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Source: HSJ, 21 November 2024

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‘Putting lives at risk’: Ministers deny coronavirus tests for care home inspectors

Ministers have denied care home inspectors access to weekly testing for coronavirus – despite fears they could contribute to the spread of COVID-19 as cases rise across the country, The Independent can reveal.

The Care Quality Commission (CQC) was told by the Department of Health and Social Care last month it could not have access to regular testing for inspection teams as the watchdog prepares for 500 inspections of care homes during the next six weeks.

Officials said the teams, who are assessing care conditions for the vulnerable and elderly, did not get close enough to people to present a risk.

During the first wave of the virus, after Public Health England initially said there was no risk to care homes, an estimated 16,000 residents died from the virus.  At the height of the crisis up to 25,000 NHS patients were discharged to care homes by the NHS, with many not having been tested for the virus.

Labour MP Barbara Keeley said: “The refusal of the Department of Health and Social Care to treat CQC inspectors in the same way as other staff going into care homes puts lives at risk.”

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Source: The Independent, 20 October 2020

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‘Punishment beatings’ cause NHS leaders to hide problems, says Streeting

A political culture “geared around sparing reputations” rather than being honest about the NHS’s failings has led to “backside covering” by senior managers trying to avoid “punishment beatings”, the health and care secretary has said.

Wes Streeting also told the health and social care committee yesterday that these cultural failings had contributed to a situation in which “on pretty much every front, care in this country is not as good as our counterparts”.

To address this, Mr Streeting said he wanted to set a culture which was “honest about the NHS’s failings”, rather than one that is “geared around sparing political blushes”.

He said the culture of the NHS is “set at the top” by the health secretary, which is why he has labelled the health service as “broken” in a bid to set a tone of honesty about its failings.

Mr Streeting said: “A political culture geared around sparing political blushes and reputations of governments is one that very quickly bleeds into backside-covering by senior leaders, thinking that if they acknowledge problems within their organisation that they are going to find themselves in news headlines or [receiving] a punishment beating by the secretary of state via the telephone.

“It also persists into a culture right down into the frontline where patient safety isn’t taken seriously [and] where whistleblowers are silenced in the most extreme cases. And you end up in a situation where, on pretty much every front, care in this country is not as good as our counterparts.”

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Source: HSJ, 19 December 2024

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‘Profound disappointment’ as ICBs are allowed to cut safety funding

A leading midwife and chair of government maternity inquiries has cited “significant concern about safety and wellbeing” following a substantial cut to nationally ring-fenced funding.

The concerns follow more than £90m of service development funding being cut from maternity allocations and transferred into core integrated care board budgets in 2025-26, as revealed by HSJ this week.

NHS England said “maternity care remains a top priority” and it was “misleading” to suggest otherwise. But leading maternity safety campaigners and royal colleges expressed concerns that funding will now be lost because of deficits and competing demands.

NHSE 2025-26 planning guidance says organisations must still “improve safety in maternity and neonatal services, delivering the key actions of the ‘three-year delivery plan’”, as well as “paying particular attention to challenged and fragile services, including maternity and neonatal”.

Donna Ockenden, a former senior midwife,  who chaired a government-commissioned review into maternity failings in Shropshire and is currently leading its inquiry into Nottingham Hospitals, said on social media site X: “Talking to colleagues across perinatal services, the sense of disappointment is profound, with everyone I’ve spoken to tonight expressing significant concern about safety and the wellbeing of children and mental health.”

Influential safety campaigner James Titcombe said the move was “pulling in the opposite direction to promises health and social care secretary Wes Streeting had made to families failed by poor maternity care”.

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Source: HSJ, 1 May 2025

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‘Postcode lottery’ in robotic surgery access for patients, data shows

NHS patients in England are facing a “postcode lottery” in access to robotic-assisted surgery, according to an analysis by the Royal College of Surgeons of England.

The data, published on 20 April, shows that despite national guidance from NHS England there remain major differences in how the technology is funded, distributed and used across NHS trusts in England.

Freedom of Information data from NHS trusts reveal that there is no consistent funding model for robotic surgery with some trusts, such as Royal United Hospitals Bath NHS Foundation Trust, relying on charitable funding.

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Source: Digital Health, 21 April 2026

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‘Post-birth incontinence robbed me of my 30s – women should not be made to feel it’s normal’

Like most women affected by incontinence, 43-year-old Luce Brett has her horror stories. As a 30-year-old first time mum she recalls wetting herself and bursting into tears in the “Mothercare aisle of shame”, where maternity pads and adult nappies sit alongside the baby nappies, wipes and potties.

But, she adds, these isolated anecdotes don’t really do justice to what living with incontinence is really like. “It’s every day, it’s all day. People talk about leaking when you sneeze or when you laugh, but for me it was also when I stood up, or walked upstairs. It was always having two different outfits every time I left the house to go to the shops. Incontinence robbed me of my thirties; it made me suicidally depressed,” Luce explains.

“Everyone kept telling me it was normal to be leaky after a vaginal birth. It took quite a long time for me to find the courage or the words to stop them and say: ‘Everybody in my NCT (National Childbirth Trust) class can walk around with a sling on, and I can’t do that without wetting myself constantly’,” she adds.

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‘Plug-and-play’ regtech solution enhances patient safety

With a focus on pharmaceutical supply chain regulation, Bonafi is one of the latest companies to launch within the regtech startup sector.

“Companies operating in the global pharma industry must verify that those they are buying from and selling to are authorised to handle medicinal products for human use in their own countries,” explains its founder, Katarina Antill. “At present, this verification process is manual. Companies are using screenshots as proof and relying on spreadsheets to track verification activities, which increases the risk of errors.”

“Manual processes are very labour intensive not least because companies must deal with multiple registries across multiple countries,” she says. “Most pharma manufacturers and wholesalers don’t have the resources to reverify their trading partners more than once a year, which is the current minimum legal requirement, and this too creates a potential vulnerability that can ultimately have an impact on patient safety and increase corporate risk.

 “I could see that this huge volume of manual work was a threat to patient-safety and extremely inefficient,” she adds. “Our solution gives companies much greater control over their compliance activities because they no longer have to rely on manual processes. It can also retrieve and aggregate data from multiple registers across multiple countries and has a constant monitoring and alert system, quality management dashboards, electronic signatures and workflows and will strengthen the attributes of traceability, transparency and security. It is all designed to help companies to be pro-active in their compliance activities, enabling them to go beyond compliance alone to reduce corporate risk and patient risk.”

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Source: The Irish Times, 13 February 2020

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‘Persistently failing managers will be sacked’, says Streeting

Wes Streeting wants NHS England to step up intervention in under-performing NHS organisations, and give greater flexibility to strong-performers – including over capital investment, he will say today.

The health and social care secretary will promise new “league tables” and say he wants ”top talent attracted to [the] most challenging areas” while “persistently failing managers [will] be sacked”.

A new NHS Oversight and Assessment Framework will be confirmed by April, to “ensure performance is properly scrutinised”, the Department of Health and Social Care said.

It is expected to put greater focus on the “capability” of trusts and integrated care boards, as well as their performance and outcomes — something NHSE consulted on in the spring.  The promised league tables are expected to cover waiting times, finance and leadership, sources said.

NHSE will also publish a new “Performance, Improvement and Regulation Framework”, to set out more clearly and when and how it will intervene, but it is at an early stage, HSJ understands.

Poor performers will be subject to deep dives by the government and NHSE, with turnaround teams sent in to fix any issues, a Department of Health and Social Care announcement said.

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Source: HSJ, 13 November 2024

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‘Perilous’ shortage of homecare workers leaves patients trapped in hospitals

A “perilous” shortage of homecare workers is the biggest reason thousands of people are languishing longer in hospital than needed, driving up waiting lists and making people sicker, figures reveal.

Almost one in four people unable to be discharged – sometimes for weeks – were trapped in hospital because they were waiting for home care, as agencies hand back contracts because staff are quitting owing to low pay, leaving 15% of jobs vacant.

A fifth of people unable to be discharged were also waiting for short-term rehabilitation and 15% were waiting for a bed in a care home, according to analysis of data obtained using freedom of information requests and public records by Nuffield Trust and the Health Foundation.

It estimated that in April this year, one in six patients were in hospital because of delayed discharge, and the discharge of patients with a hospital stay of more than three weeks was delayed by 14 days on average.

“People are ending up in hospital for malnutrition and dehydration, problems which, even if you supported people a little bit at home, would stop,” said Jane Townson, the director of the Homecare Association.

“More providers are having to turn down work than usual and some are having to hand back people because they can’t do it.”

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Source: The Guardian, 3 October 2022

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‘People will die’: Trump administration cancels up to $1.9bn for substance use and mental health

The Trump administration on Tuesday evening unexpectedly canceled up to $1.9bn in funding for substance use and mental health care, which providers say will immediately affect thousands of patients.

“It feels like Armageddon for everyone who’s on the frontlines of the addiction and mental health space,” said Ryan Hampton, founder of Mobilize Recovery, a national advocacy organization for people in and seeking recovery.

“The scope of care that’s disrupted by these grants is catastrophic. Tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of people will die.”

As many as 2,800 grantees through the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (Samhsa) received a letter immediately ending their funding – about 26% of Samhsa’s entire budget.

“These are programs that save lives, so the impact could be really devastating,” said Regina LaBelle, former acting director of the Biden White House office of national drug control policy and professor at Georgetown University.

“It really covers the spectrum of prevention, treatment and recovery services, both on substance use and mental health,” said Yngvild Olsen, who until last July served as the director for the Center for Substance Abuse Treatment at Samhsa and is now a national adviser at Manatt Health.

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Source: The Guardian, 14 January 2026

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‘People are being very angry with us’: A&E doctor on abuse of NHS staff

Dr Katherine Henderson, a senior A&E consultant in London and President of the Royal College of Emergency Medicine, says physical and verbal attacks have increased in recent months.

Speaking to the Guardian, she says: “It is a sad reality that in recent months there has been a rise in abuse directed towards healthcare workers, but this abuse is not something new to frontline staff or emergency departments. It was bad before the pandemic, but there’s a changed atmosphere now.

“During the pandemic people were being very positive about healthcare workers. But now the public are frustrated that services aren’t getting back to normal. Maybe people who weren’t the source of abuse before are now being the source of abuse. Abuse may be physical or verbal, it may be through social media, or it may be racial or misogynistic.

“People are being angry – very angry – with us. They are angry about long waits, about having to stand outside emergency departments in queues, about delays in ambulances coming, including to take their relative home from hospital. The public haven’t really caught up with how struggling the whole NHS is."

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Source: The Guardian, 10 October 2021

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‘Payment by results’ style system returns for electives

The health service in England is returning to a payment-by-results-style system for elective activity, new guidance confirms.

Providers struggled to hit elective targets in 2022-23, in large part due to ongoing covid, emergency care and staffing pressures, but some have argued that incentives to carry out more activity are too weak.

Proposals for the NHS payment system for 2023-24 issued state: “The large backlog in elective care is a significant issue for the NHS and the patients who rely on it. We want the NHSPS to include an elective funding mechanism which means that providers are paid based on the level of activity they deliver.”

The plans add: “The approach we are proposing gives providers maximum financial incentive to deliver the elective activity targets they are being set.”

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Source: HSJ, 23 December 2022

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‘Patients are choosing palliative care over cancer treatment’ due to lack of local services, CEO warns

Patients in part of the East of England are choosing to begin palliative care over cancer treatment because of prohibitive travel times and costs to get to the nearest specialist centre, a local system leader has warned.

The Bedfordshire, Luton and Milton Keynes Integrated Care Board CEO said delays to a proposed £400m project, which includes creating “satellite” treatment centres on its patch, was therefore putting lives at risk and widening inequalities.

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Source: HSJ, 13 May 2024

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