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Sam

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  1. Sam
    It was in a coroner’s court last year, at the inquest into the death of his 27-year-old daughter Maeve, that Sean O’Neill heard the most dispiriting words. The coroner, Deborah Archer, said she was going to write a prevention of future deaths (PFD) report, highlighting to the NHS and other agencies areas of concern. Then she added: “I write a lot of these reports, and often nothing happens.”
    Maeve died after suffering for half her life with myalgic encephalomyelitis (ME), a post-viral condition that is not well understood, inadequately researched and which doctors often refuses to recognise or treat.
    Sean's aim was to use the media to highlight what happened to Maeve and raise awareness of the plight of the hundreds of thousands of people whose lives are limited by ME and similar conditions. His second aim was to convince the coroner to write a PFD report and point out areas in healthcare, medical research, education and training where action could be taken that might prevent further such deaths.
    The written responses to Archer’s PFD report have been underwhelming. The public health minister, (the recently resigned) Andrew Gwynne, promised an NHS delivery plan. NHS England said it would do a “stocktake” of ME services, even though there had been evidence at the inquest that such services are scarce, and in the cases of severely ill patients, “non-existent”. The Medical Research Council said it “recognises the unmet clinical need for better diagnosis and treatments for people living with ME” but defended its record to date.
    In 2023 there were more than 1,600 inquests that had been open for more than two years; often these are the most difficult cases, yet bereaved families face being repeatedly traumatised by every preliminary hearing and legal letter.
    As in Maeve’s case, the best hope for a family is that a PFD report points the way to reform. A coroner is not allowed to recommend, only suggest. Yet only rarely are these reports written. 
    Those coroners who do write reports often find their suggestions ignored. Just under 40% of the 5,532 PFD reports published since 2013 have received no responses. There is no other section of the legal system in greater need of reform. There should be a national coronial service, more PFD reports should be written and lessons should be disseminated. What is the point of investigating avoidable deaths — of making bereaved families relive their trauma, of spending millions of public pounds — unless we are prepared to learn how to avoid similar fatal errors?
    Read full story (paywalled)
    Source: The Times, 23 February 2025
  2. Sam
    Losing Ben at the age of eight weeks in the paediatric intensive care unit of the Bristol Royal hospital for children in the spring of 2015 was traumatic and heartbreaking for Jenny and Allyn Condon.
    In the 10 years since, they say their pain has not eased but, if anything, has been made more acute by the way they have been treated by a health trust as they campaigned to find out why Ben died.
    “It has destroyed me,” said Jenny, who tried to kill herself and has post-traumatic stress syndrome. “I’m a broken woman. I’m in constant fight or flight.”
    Speaking at the end of a two-week inquest that concluded on Friday – which laid bare failings in Ben’s care and was often contradictory, complex and, as his parents see it, adversarial – Allyn said their precious memories of Ben had been taken away by the approach of the trust that runs the hospital.
    Ben was born prematurely on 17 February 2015. In April, he developed breathing difficulties and was taken to the children’s hospital, where doctors diagnosed human metapneumovirus (hMPV), a respiratory infection. He declined rapidly, had two cardiac arrests on 17 April and died.
    The Condons were immediately told that no postmortem examination was needed as the cause of death was straightforward. Doctors recorded acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS), hMPV and prematurity on his death certificate and his body was cremated. But several weeks after Ben died his parents were told that he also had a bacterial infection.
    A first inquest, in 2016, concluded that two respiratory illnesses and prematurity caused Ben’s death, but the next year, after the Condons continued to press, the University Hospitals Bristol and Weston NHS Foundation Trust admitted that a failure to give him antibiotics in a timely manner for the bacterial infection contributed to his death.
    In 2021, the NHS ombudsman said Ben died after “a catalogue of failings” in his treatment and there was an attempt to “deceive” his parents. The high court quashed the conclusions of the first inquest and a new inquest has taken place at Avon coroner’s court near Bristol.
    On Friday, the coroner who has heard the second inquest, Robert Sowersby, backed the Condons’ belief that the death certificate and conclusion of the first inquest were incomplete.
    Sowersby, the assistant coroner for Avon, stated that between 14 and 16 April consultants decided not to give Ben antibiotics. Sowersby said: “I find Ben should have been given antibiotics by 16 April at the latest,” and added that if he had been given antibiotics it would have stopped the pseudomonas infection entering his bloodstream.
    The coroner said some medics had a “patronising approach” to Ben’s parents and that Jenny and Allyn were not told what was going on or why and were not involved in important decisions. He said it was “hard” to understand a delay in telling them how sick Ben was.
    Sowersby said: “A lot of mistakes were made. The actions of various employees who were involved in Ben’s care or in subsequent investigations understandably aroused suspicion and contributed to the family’s inability to believe anything they were being told.”
    Read full story
    Source: The Guardian, 21 February 2025
  3. Sam
    The Care Quality Commission has been criticised by the High Court for failing to follow its own conflict of interest policy, after a legal challenge by a mental health provider.
    Cygnet, the private inpatient mental health provider, instigated the judicial review against the regulator, accusing it of failing to follow its conflict of interest policies in its choice of inspector.
    The CQC will now have to review its report into one of the Cygnet-run sites, the Acer Hospital in Chesterfield. It was given an “inadequate” rating, an unusual outcome for a focused inspection, and put into special measures over risks to patients and poor staffing.
    The inspector at the centre of the case – who cannot be named because of reporting restrictions – had previously been detained in two hospitals run by Cygnet in 2012-13 – and had complained about his care and treatment.
    The former mental health nurse went on to become a CQC inspector and started to inspect facilities run by Cygnet in 2019.
    At a court hearing, Cygnet argued seven inspection reports on five of its sites, and enforcement action taken against one of them, were affected by the inspector’s apparent bias. The CQC had previously refused to review these reports and enforcement action, the provider said.
    Read full story (paywalled)
    Source: HSJ, 24 February 2025
  4. Sam
    NHS England has launched a £37bn framework for the largest hospital-building drive in decades, in a bid to bolster market capacity.
    It is hoped this will address concerns over a lack of construction market capacity that has been considered a potential threat to the programme.
    The agreement is for major capital works in the New Hospital Programme, which has faced significant delays since being set up to deliver 40 projects by 2030.
    The government claimed the original Conservative plan was unrealistic and further shifted timelines last month –  with nearly half now starting construction after that date.
    NHSE said the Hospital 2.0 framework agreement would cover hospital building, refurbishment and ancillary works – including design – for schemes.
    The contract notice said: “NHSE is seeking expressions of interest from suppliers with suitable major project experience, capacity and the capability to deliver complex hospital build and refurbishment construction works.”
    Read full story (paywalled)
    Source: HSJ, 17 February 2025
  5. Sam
    Outpatient visits have surged to their highest levels since the peak of the 2009 swine flu pandemic, with influenza-related emergency department visits remaining very high across the US.
    Notably, flu-related outpatient vists are now at their highest point since 2009, with 7.8% of visits for inflenza in the week ending 1 February 2025.
    Nineteen states reported high respiratory virus activity and thirteen states reported very high activity.
    The CDC reported that flu test positivity has risen to 31.6%, while COVID-19 positivity decreased to 4.9% and RSV positivity decreased to 6.6%. 

    Emergency department visits for influenza remained very high, while visits for Covid-19 were low and RSV-related visits were moderate. 

    Vaccination coverage for both COVID-19 and influenza remained low, and RSV vaccine uptake is also notably low for both children and adults. 
    Read full story
    Source: Becker's Clinical Leadership, 11 February 2025
  6. Sam
    Women harmed by pelvic mesh implants are still waiting for government compensation a year after a major report called for urgent action. Patient safety commissioner Dr Henrietta Hughes, who made that recommendation, called it "an injustice" for the thousands of lives destroyed. 
    5 News hears from Kath Sansom, campaigner and founder of Sling the Mesh.  Listen at 24 minutes.
     
  7. Sam
    A group of researchers and students at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health are scraping and downloading data related to health equity from U.S. government agency websites before they disappear. Their goal is to make the downloaded data publicly available through repositories such as the Harvard Dataverse.
    The new Trump administration has at least temporality halted most communications from the Department of Health and Human Services and has begun taking down government websites, including many pages that include DEI initiatives. The Center for Disease Control and Prevention’s Youth Risk Behavior Survey site, which monitors health behaviors of high-school students, including sexual behavior, mental health and tobacco use, is no longer available.
    Health researchers worry that more of their trusted federal health databases could disappear in the coming hours and days. It’s not clear whether the changes are permanent or the websites will once again become available.
    “In my lifetime, in the United States I don’t know of another situation where researchers have been this concerned about losing access to data that they’ve had access to their whole career,” says Jonathan Gilmour, a data scientist at the Chan School who is researching human health impacts of climate change. “It’s dire.”
    Read full story
    Source: The Journalist's Resource, 31 January 2025
  8. Sam
    A cyber attack has forced a US non-profit blood donor centre to postpone appointments despite declaring blood shortages just one week earlier. 
    New York Blood Center Enterprises announced that it had “identified suspicious activity” affecting its IT systems on on 26 January 2025.
    In a statement, published on 29 January, it said: “We immediately engaged third-party cybersecurity experts to investigate and confirmed that the suspicious activity is a result of a ransomware incident.
    “We took immediate steps to help contain the threat and are working diligently with these experts to restore our systems as quickly and as safely as possible. Law enforcement has been notified.”
    On 1 February and 2 February 17 blood drives were cancelled as a result of the cyber attack.
    The centre, which is the largest independent blood supplier in the New York City area, confirmed that although it is still accepting blood donations, “processing times may be longer than normal”.
    There is no estimated timetable for fully restoring its operations.
    The attack echoes the ransomware attack on NHS pathology provider Synnovis in June 2024, which led to NHS Blood and Transplant urgently calling for donations of O Positive and O Negative blood to boost stocks.
    Read full story
    Source: Digital Health, 3 February 2025
  9. Sam
    The government cannot commit to meeting national cancer, A&E, diagnostic, mental health and ambulance waiting time targets by the end of this Parliament, Wes Streeting has told HSJ.
    The health and social care secretary made the admission in an interview in which he also questioned the wisdom of creating NHS England and pledged to support controversial service cuts.
    Prime minister Keir Starmer has confirmed his intention to hit the 18 week elective waiting time target by 2029, but government has given mixed messages on whether it would do the same for the other constitutional standards — which have largely gone unmet for about a decade.
    He said: “I can’t say hand on heart I will definitely deliver those targets over the course of the Parliament. Or that it would be fair to set that expectation on NHS leaders.”
    However, Mr Streeting added: “The constitutional standards matter. They are there for a reason and I know the frustration the public feel about the NHS not being there for them when they need it is also felt acutely by staff, who are confronted with the grim reality of what that means for patients.”
    NHS England and the Department of Health and Social Care yesterday revealed they would shrink their organisations, and consider more joint working. 
    He said although he would not legally scrap NHSE, there would be more change to “eliminate waste and duplication” across the two and on “clarifying roles and responsibilities in the coming months”.
    “As far as I’m concerned, the [department] is responsible for policy and strategy… and we drive improvement through the delivery organisation which is NHS England.”
    Read full story (paywalled)
    Source: HSJ, 31 January 2025
  10. Sam
    Staff in a children's hospital were caught on CCTV footage abusing patients by dragging them, according to a health watchdog's report.
    Care Quality Commission (CQC) inspectors found three cases where children were physically abused by staff at Cygnet Joyce Parker Hospital in Coventry.
    The report said children told inspectors staff "sometimes bent their wrist" or hurt them by "twisting their knee".
    The hospital said it continued to "strongly refute" any allegations of abuse and police had ended an investigation into safeguarding cases. 
    The hospital, run by Cygnet Health Care Limited, has changed its use since the inspection and now only provides services to adult male patients.
    The report, after a CQC visit to the 43-bed mental health unit in July, said inspectors reviewed CCTV footage for three cases of restraint where children were physically abused by staff.
    "Staff were observed dragging children and young people during these incidents," they said.
    "For all three incidents reviewed, there was no apparent risk requiring restraint presented by the young person."
    They added there was no evidence of staff trying to de-escalate the situation before restraining the children.The report said footage identified 12 members of staff as "passive bystanders" who did not raise concerns.Read full story
    Source: BBC News, 30 January 2025
  11. Sam
    A world-first genetic warning system to stop future pandemics has been launched in the UK.
    The surveillance programme, run by the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA), will see experts rapidly checking NHS samples for pathogens that could lead to serious outbreaks.
    It is thought it could also stop emerging diseases.
    Experts believe if such a system had been around pre-Covid-19, the virus would have been spotted much more quickly and there would have been early signs it was taking root in the UK.
    Traditionally, genomic methods rely on scientists or medics knowing what virus or bacteria they are looking for when they test a swab sample.
    But a more detailed method – known as metagenomics – means they do not need to know what the pathogen is, and they can test samples to find new ones.
    All this information is also now being fed to the UKHSA at a national level, bringing together samples from NHS hospitals across England to spot trends and emerging clusters of disease.
    Read full story
    Source: The Independent, 30 January 2025
  12. Sam
    Children in the UK are suffering “irreversible harm” and lifelong consequences as a result of “unacceptable” delays in accessing physiotherapy, experts have warned.
    Teenagers face lifelong trauma from untreated chronic pain while children as young as four are waiting 18 months for critical treatment, according to a survey of paediatric physiotherapists.
    Lengthy delays to treatment while children’s bodies are still growing can have seriously harmful repercussions for their health that can last decades.
    Some families are being forced to travel more than 200 miles for NHS physiotherapy services because of delays or a lack of access where they live. Others are having to go private to ensure their children get the urgent care that they need.
    The Association of Paediatric Chartered Physiotherapists (APCP), a professional network of members of the Chartered Society of Physiotherapy, surveyed 155 staff across the UK who specialise in treating babies, children and teenagers.
    Sara Hazzard, assistant director at the Chartered Society of Physiotherapy, said children waiting for rehabilitation for illnesses and injury were experiencing harm and distress that could last a lifetime.
    “The fact that this is happening up and down the UK is not just unacceptable, it is failing a generation.”
    Staff shortages and cuts to services were causing the delays, while at the same time the NHS was failing to create enough new posts to meet the “overwhelming” demand for care, Hazzard said.
    “Families should not fear for their child’s health and future because they can only get help and rehabilitation if they can afford to pay. Urgent action is needed.”
    Read more
    Source: The Guardian, 31 January 2025
  13. Sam
    A new method for detecting bowel cancer is more than 90% accurate at predicting which higher-risk people will develop the disease, according to research.
    About 500,000 people in the UK live with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), including Crohn's and ulcerative colitis.
    Currently, they are offered regular checks for pre-cancerous growths in their gut, which, if detected, indicate about a 30% chance of bowel cancer developing over 10 years.
    But the UK research found DNA changes in those pre-cancerous cells, when analysed by an algorithm, were more than 90% accurate in predicting who would develop bowel cancer over the next five years.
    Prof Trevor Graham, from the Institute of Cancer Research in London, said: "Most people with ulcerative colitis or Crohn's disease won't develop bowel cancer.
    "But for those that have these conditions and are showing signs of pre-cancer in their colon, there are some tough decisions to make.
    "Either they have it monitored regularly, in the hope that it doesn't become cancer, or they have their bowel removed to guarantee they don't get cancer in the future.
    "Neither of these options are particularly pleasant.
    "Our test and algorithm give people with IBD, and the doctors who care for them, the best possible information so that they can make the right decision about how to manage their cancer risk."
    Read full story
    Source: BBC News, 30 January 2025
  14. Sam
    A coroner has ordered an integrated care board to fill gaps in its services and address mental health bed shortages following the death of a 29-year-old with autism and ADHD who spent 26 days in A&E.
    Matthew “Matty” Sheldrick (they/them), who identified as non-binary, died from self-ligature outside Royal Sussex County Hospital after returning to A&E one month on from the 26-day stay. Matty had struggled to access community services for support with their mental health, autism, and ADHD.
    Confusion about and delays to appointments during their time in hospital and the community contributed to a sense of hopelessness, according to Matty’s mother, Shelagh Sheldrick.
    In two prevention of future death reports published last month, senior area coroner Penelope Schofield said Matty received “no meaningful therapeutic input” during their prolonged first stay in an A&E short-stay ward and that the environment “contributed to the deterioration of their mental health difficulties”.
    In a report addressed to Sussex Integrated Care Board, Ms Schofield raised concerns over a lack of funding for private mental health beds for autism patients, and the fact that oversubscribed public providers “very often” rejected referrals for autism patients because of “additional risks”.
    Read full story (paywalled)
    Source: HSJ, 28 January 2025
  15. Sam
    England’s top doctor has warned the equivalent of half the country’s population will be attending emergency departments every year within a decade unless more work is done to move healthcare out of hospitals.
    NHS national medical director Professor Sir Stephen Powis said if the health system wants to avoid a situation of overcrowded A&Es by 2034 then it “must go for broke” by moving more care into communities.
    A&Es in England faced the busiest year on record in 2024, with 27.42 million attendances across the year, 7.1 per cent higher than in 2023, according to NHS England.
    In a speech at Liverpool Medical Institution on Wednesday evening, Professor Powis said caring for more patients outside of hospitals was key to reducing pressure on accident and emergency departments long term.
    “Because we know that if A&E attendances increase at the same rate as they have over the past 10 years – NHS staff will need to manage six million more A&E attendances every year from 2034,” he is expected to say.
    “That would mean the equivalent of almost half the population attend A&E at least once every year – that is simply not feasible for a 21st-century health system.
    “If the NHS is to avoid a situation of overcrowded A&Es in 10 years’ time – we must go for broke in moving care from hospital to the community.”
    Read full story
    Source: The Independent, 22 January 2025
  16. Sam
    Women in Britain are paying up to £11,154 for a hysterectomy in a private hospital, amid huge delays for NHS gynaecological care, research reveals.
    The cost of undergoing the procedure privately has soared by 19% from £7,385 in 2021 to £8,795 last year, at a time when NHS waiting lists have risen sharply.
    The disclosure has prompted claims independent sector healthcare providers are taking advantage of long waits for health service treatment by increasing their prices.
    The number of women waiting for care in an NHS hospital for conditions such as fibroids and endometriosis more than doubled from 360,400 when Covid struck in 2020 to 749,329, the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists has shown.
    In November 584,607 women in England were on an NHS gynaecological waiting list, with 20,809 of them being on the list for more than a year, which led to a growing number of women going private to beat delays.
    Dr Ranee Thakar, the RCOG’s president, said untreated conditions “have a devastating impact on almost every aspect of [women’s] lives, including their physical and mental health, and their ability to work and socialise.
    “Long NHS waiting times are certainly a factor in why some women choose to have their surgery privately,” she added.
    Read full story
    Source: The Guardian, 24 January 2025
  17. Sam
    A raft of reforms NHS England and the government are proposing to address the crisis in urgent and emergency care can be revealed after a draft of the recovery plan was obtained by HSJ.
    HSJ has seen an early “confidential working draft” of the national UEC improvement plan, which national officials are still working on, for publication in the coming weeks.
    It is likely to develop, and HSJ understands officials are considering taking on board recommendations from cross-sector proposals published earlier this week. 
    The draft seen by HSJ confirms a target for 2025-26 to increase four-hour A&E performance to 78% – the same target as in 2024-25 – despite health secretary Wes Streeting having originally pledged to return the NHS to meeting the 95 per cent standard by 2029. 
    The new proposals are instead centred on 10 ‘action’ points for trusts and systems. They include aims to reduce 111 calls put through to 999 or A&E, and “avoidable” ambulance conveyances and handover delays; implement rapid triage at the ‘front door’ of A&Es; improve patient flow and access to mental health services; and deliver more care closer to home.
    It also goes on also say that NHSE should separately “performance manage” A&Es on the length of waits for patients who attend with less serious conditions and therefore are not admitted.
    As part of a “refreshed improvement offer,” an NHSE UEC improvement team will identify around 25 per cent of A&E sites which are “most in need” and work with them on “a clinical commitment to change whilst deploying multi-disciplinary improvement support” for a time limited period.
    Read full story (paywalled)
    Source: HSJ, 23 January 2025
  18. Sam
    The Trump administration has instructed federal health agencies to pause all external communications, such as health advisories, weekly scientific reports, updates to websites and social media posts, according to nearly a dozen current and former officials and other people familiar with the matter.
    The instructions were delivered Tuesday to staff at agencies inside the Department of Health and Human Services, including officials at the Food and Drug Administration, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and National Institutes of Health, one day after the new administration took office.
    The health agencies are charged with making decisions that touch the lives of every American and are the source of crucial information to health-care providers and organizations across the country.
    The pause on communications includes scientific reports issued by the CDC, known as the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR); advisories sent out to clinicians on CDC’s health alert network about public health incidents; data updates to the CDC website; and public health data releases from the National Center for Health Statistics, which tracks myriad health trends, including drug overdose deaths.
    The CDC was scheduled to publish several MMWR reports this week, including three about the H5N1 avian influenza virus outbreak, according to one federal health official who spoke on the condition of anonymity to share internal discussions.
    It was not clear from the guidance given by the new administration whether the directive will affect more urgent communications, such as foodborne disease outbreaks, drug approvals and new bird flu cases.
    Read full story (paywalled)
    Source: The Washington Post, 21 January 2025
  19. Sam
    Wes Streeting has vowed to scrap more than a million “pointless” NHS hospital appointments as he seeks to cut waiting lists.
    The Health Secretary said that “waste of time” hospital check-ups could be scrapped, which would free up consultants to carry out more operations.
    Officials say that around half of these routine check-ups could be phased out by making greater use of smart watches and wearable tech to monitor patients’ blood pressure levels remotely.
    The NHS plans will increasingly scrap the use of routine follow-up appointments after elective surgery – putting the onus on patients to decide if they need further checks.
    Read full story (paywalled)
    Source: The Telegraph, 5 January 2025
  20. Sam
    The proportion of patients diagnosed with cancer at an early stage has risen to its highest level on record, NHS figures in England show.
    Data for the 13 most common cancers show 58.7% of those diagnosed between September 2023 and August 2024 were identified at stages one and two, which increases the chances of survival.
    That is 2.7 percentage points up since before the pandemic – and the highest since records began more than 10 years ago.
    NHS England said a combination of public awareness campaigns and new screening approaches has made a big difference.
    But despite the progress England is still struggling to achieve its ambition of diagnosing 75% of cancer at stages one and two by 2028.
    And the NHS is also failing to hit its target for starting treatment quickly – nearly one in three people diagnosed with cancer wait longer than 62 days from an urgent referral.
    According to a Nuffield Trust report, external last year these are all factors in why cancer survival rates in the UK lag behind many other comparable countries.
    Read full story
    Source: BBC News, 2 January 2025
  21. Sam
    The father of a seven-week-old boy who died after being breastfed in a baby carrier is calling for increased safety standards around baby slings.
    James Alderman, who was known as Jimmy, was being breastfed "hands-free" within a baby carrier worn by his mother while she moved around their home.
    Jimmy's father, George Alderman, told Sky News: "Baby slings are sold as being a lifesaver, allowing you to get on with your business while your baby's safe and close to you, but in this instance, we had our baby close, but not safe."
    The inquest into his death heard Jimmy was in an unsafe position too far down the sling.
    Mr Alderman said that while much of the available advice around slings focused on them not being too tight, few people were aware of the danger of the sling not being tight enough, and so allowing the baby to slump.
    Explaining what medical experts think happened to Jimmy, he said: "After he'd been feeding, he fell asleep and then he slumped forwards. Then, because his head was covered and he had his chin against his chest, he was facing downwards.
    "Nothing was covering his face, but because of the position he was in, that meant that not enough oxygen was going into his lungs because he was small and not fully developed, and that's why he stopped breathing."
    Mr Alderman said that while many brands of baby carriers said they were safe for breastfeeding, the lack of advice around how to safely do it meant that parents were "left to work it out by themselves".
    Read full story
    Source: Sky News, 30 December 2024
  22. Sam
    Failings at a hospital contributed to the death of a 55-year-old woman who suffered abdominal sepsis after weight loss surgery at the time of a junior doctors’ strike, a coroner has said.
    Susan Evans returned to Queen Alexandra hospital in Portsmouth, Hampshire, with stomach pains two days after undergoing elective gastric bypass surgery.
    She was sent home without being seen by a member of the specialist bariatric team or a senior doctor, though hospital policy says this should happen, and became seriously unwell.
    Evans returned to hospital and underwent two further operations but died a month after the original procedure.
    In a prevention of future deaths report, the coroner Sally Olsen said neither written nor informal policies had been followed and failures “contributed more than minimally” to Evans’s death.
    Read full story
    Source: The Guardian, 1 January 2025
  23. Sam
    Weight-loss injections are being aggressively marketed to British consumers through often illegal promotions, in a practice experts have described as a “wild west” industry of drug selling.
    The booming market for jabs such as Wegovy and Mounjaro has triggered a price battle among online pharmacies, with even high-street chains cashing in on the soaring demand.
    Last month, the pharmaceutical company Novo Nordisk revealed global sales of Wegovy hit £1.94bn in the third quarter of the year, up 48% from the previous quarter and outstripping expectations.
    However, a Guardian review of reports by the watchdog that regulates medical advertising in the UK shows that many online pharmacies are flouting strict rules that govern how prescription-only drugs can be marketed in Britain.
    Read full story
    Source: The Guardian, 26 December 2024
  24. Sam
    The NHS is at risk of paralysis while it waits for Wes Streeting’s 10-year plan for reform and needs to be empowered to get on with change in the face of huge waiting times for care, a thinktank has said.
    Victor Adebowale, a cross-bench peer and chair of the Institute for Public Policy Research, said a clear message is needed from Streeting that leaders in the health service should be able to start bringing in reforms where they are aligned with the government’s priorities.
    He described long waits for care as “the tragic new normal” for many patients in the NHS and highlighted IPPR analysis showing that 25 times more people waited over four hours in A&E this summer than during the same period in 2009.
    Lord Adebowale is also chair of the NHS Confederation, the membership body for health authorities and trusts in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. Writing in his role as IPPR chair, he said several senior NHS leaders have described to the thinktank “a feeling of ‘sitting and waiting’ for the 10-year plan, unable to initiate major change in the meantime”.
    Read full story
    Source: The Guardian, 26 December 2024
  25. Sam
    A woman died soon after the birth of her fifth child due to "basic failures" in her care, a report said.
    Laura-Jane Seaman, 36, died at Broomfield Hospital, Chelmsford, Essex, on 23 December 2022 following a significant peritoneal haemorrhage.
    A prevention of future deaths report by a coroner said the bleeding was not identified, despite Ms Seaman's repeated concerns that she was "gushing" - and her appeals to staff to "not let me die".
    Ms Seaman had been admitted to the hospital on 21 December and while the birth of her baby was uneventful, she subsequently suffered a haemorrhage that was not noticed by staff for hours - despite her having a known history of haemorrhages.
    Earlier this year, a coroner had found multiple "gross failures" by healthcare professionals and said if these had not occurred, Ms Seaman, from Witham, would not have died.
    Read full story
    Source: The Guardian, 24 December 2024

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