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Content ArticleThe COVID-19 Recovery Committee has published its report on Long Covid and post-Covid syndrome, urging the Scottish Government to take action to address the stigma surrounding the condition and improve awareness among the public and healthcare professionals. The inquiry focussed on the awareness and recognition, therapy and rehabilitation, and study and research linked to Long Covid, with the Committee noting “concern” in their findings over reports of patients being unable to get the correct diagnosis and the lack of treatment for common conditions associated with the condition. The Committee said it was “deeply saddened” to learn about the stigma faced by those with lived and living experience of Long Covid, and the report highlights the impact that the lack of awareness and recognition of Long Covid can have on those with the condition.
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News Article
Alternative to epidural recommended for women in labour
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
Women in labour should be offered an alternative to an epidural spinal block injection, say new draft guidelines for the NHS. The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) is recommending remifentanil, which is a fast-acting morphine-like drug given into a vein. Women control the medication themselves, by pressing a button to get more of the drug for pain relief. A timer ensures the user cannot administer too much of it. Women who decide to try remifentanil and do not like it could still decide to have an epidural instead if there is no medical reason why they should not. They can use gas and air, also called Entonox, which is a mix of oxygen and nitrous oxide, at the same time. NICE says having remifentanil as a treatment option has advantages - it might enable women to be more mobile than with an epidural, which makes the legs numb and weak, for example. Evidence suggests fewer epidurals might mean fewer births using instruments like forceps and ventouse vacuum suction, says NICE. Read full story Source: BBC News, 25 April 2023 -
Content ArticleHow can improvement-led delivery enhance the quality of outcomes for our patients, communities and our health and care workforce? In April 2022, Amanda Pritchard requested a review of the way in which the NHS, working in partnership, delivers effectively on its current priorities while developing the culture and capability for continuous improvement. Led by Anne Eden, NHS Regional Director South East, with a steering group chaired by Sir David Sloman, Chief Operating Officer, NHS England, the review team co-developed 10 recommendations with health and care leaders that have been consolidated into three actions.
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News Article
National ambitions for use of NHS App undermined by plateauing performance
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
Take-up and usage of the NHS App in England has begun to plateau, after covid drove huge growth, figures seen by HSJ suggest. This can be seen in the percentage of GP appointments booked or cancelled using the app; the number of records viewed; and the number of times it has been downloaded. Rapid uptake was driven during covid restrictions, when travel and other activities often required a covid vaccination pass. Government has said it wants the growth to continue. The number of GP appointments booked or cancelled using the app fell for a third consecutive month in March to 212,954, representing a decrease of 15% since January and 28% on October 2022, when usage peaked. The NHS app is central to government’s plan for digital health and care, published last year, billed as the “digital front door” to the NHS which would aid the recovery of services post-pandemic. Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 19 April 2023 -
Content ArticleOutpatient and daycase hysteroscopy and polypectomy (OPHP) are widely recognised methods for the treatment of endometrial polyps. There have been concerns regarding pain affecting satisfaction and tolerability of the outpatient procedure. Dr Bhawana Purwar and colleagues from the Royal Wolverhampton Hospitals NHS Trust conducted a service evaluation of their outpatient hysteroscopy and polypectomy (OPHP) and compared it with their daycase procedures. They concluded that the OPHP is cost-effective and efficient method with reasonable acceptability. It is well tolerated with remarkable success rates and excellent patient satisfaction. As compared to daycase group, it requires less time for recovery and sooner returns to work.
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Content ArticlePatients benefit from guideline-based preventive, chronic disease, and acute care, but many do not receive it. A limitation to providing high-quality care is insufficient time for primary care providers (PCPs). The aim of this study was to quantify the time needed to provide preventive care, chronic disease care, and acute care for a nationally representative adult patient panel by a PCP alone, and by a PCP as part of a team-based care model. The authors concluded that PCPs do not have enough time to provide the guideline-recommended primary care. With team-based care the time requirements would decrease by over half, but still be excessive.
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News Article
Over two million patients have to visit GP four times for referral
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
More than two million patients each year have to make four or more repeat visits to their GP before they get a referral, a patient watchdog has warned. Patient safety campaigners said people faced waits of “weeks, months or even years” before officially joining NHS waiting lists, and that their health and wellbeing was suffering as a result. They warned it would also add to pressure on other services such as A&E departments. Research by Healthwatch England revealed what the patient watchdog called a “hidden waiting list”. “People wait for a GP appointment; they wait for their GP to tell them they will be referred; they wait for the hospital to confirm that referral; and then they join a hospital waiting list,” it said. “NHS statistics monitor only the hospital waiting list, leaving the steps between getting a GP referral and a letter confirming a hospital appointment as a dangerous ‘blind spot’ for the NHS and patients.” Read full story (paywalled) Source: The Times, 11 April 2023 -
News Article
Tory ‘neglect’ blamed for 3.6m abandoned calls to NHS 111 in England
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
Patients contacting NHS 111 in England are having to wait so long for medical help that they are abandoning millions of calls, with 3.6m ditched in the past 12 months, official figures reveal. The national helpline service is supposed to make it quicker and easier for patients to get the right advice or treatment they need, either for their physical or mental health. It is billed as being open 24 hours a day, seven days a week. However, analysis by the House of Commons Library, commissioned by the Liberal Democrats, shows callers are waiting so long to speak to someone that nearly one in five give up. In 2022, 3,682,516 calls to NHS 111 were abandoned. MPs said the “dire” figures exposed how the NHS had reached “breaking point” after years of “neglect and underfunding” by the government. The data suggests that, on average, more than 10,000 callers hang up every day without receiving medical advice or treatment. As well as being distressing for those who are unwell, abandoned NHS 111 calls pose a risk to patient safety. The problem also increases pressure on other urgent care services as people seek care elsewhere. Read full story Source: The Guardian, 10 April 2023 -
Event
NHS Confederation: Health beyond the hospital conference
Sam posted an event in Community Calendar
untilNHS Confederation are bringing together organisations working to treat people closer to home. This conference will offer an opportunity for senior leaders across health and care to come together and explore health beyond the hospital. Health beyond the hospital is a chance to come together with others working in this space to explore how we can work collaboratively to support people in their homes and the community. It will focus on three key themes: people with health conditions (older people; people with multiple and complex conditions; and children and young people); data and digital; and innovation. This will be a key opportunity for members and non-members to network with peers, to share knowledge and experience, as well as listen to experts from across healthcare. By focusing on what we can do together and uniting around patients we can shift the conversation to focus on treating people where they live and keeping them well at home. Register -
News Article
NHS patient 'stuck in hospital with months to live'
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
A woman who may only have months to live has told the BBC she is "angry and frustrated" at being in hospital five months after being cleared to go home. Charlotte Mills-Murray, 34, said attempts to organise care at her family home had been repeatedly delayed. Charlotte lives with intestinal failure caused by a severe form of Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, which weakens her body's connective tissue. She was admitted to St James's Hospital in Leeds in June 2022 following an infection, and a new Hickman line - a tube that allows feeding and the administering of pain relief - was inserted. By November, Charlotte was told she was well enough to be cared for at home, but she remains in hospital following delays in the hiring and training of staff able to support her. With limited access to a hoist which would enable her to use her wheelchair, Charlotte said she had spent 10 months "stuck in bed". Because of the complexity of her condition, Charlotte only has months to live. She believes her situation merits greater urgency because of the increased risk of infection in hospital. Charlotte qualifies for 24-hour home care support through the NHS Continuing Healthcare scheme, but she said decisions over how this would be put in place had been slow and unclear. The BBC has found a 16% rise over the past year in the number of patients in England who are in hospital despite being well enough to leave. The Department of Health and Social Care said it was "fully committed to speeding up the safe discharge of patients who no longer need to be in hospital" and was making £1.6bn available in England over the next two years to support this, on top of £700m of extra funding in 2022 to ease NHS pressures over the winter. Read full story Source: BBC News, 9 April 2023 -
Content ArticleTechnologies to assist with diabetes treatment and care have evolved rapidly over the past two decades. With each new innovation coming to the market, there are hopes that technologies will solve the numerous, complex issues related to diabetes. However, although it has been demonstrated that overall, these technologies—when available—bring major benefits to people living with diabetes, they do not make the condition disappear. This article in Diabetes Epidemiology and Management discusses the interconnections between technologies and diabetes distress, an often under-acknowledged consequence of the continuous demands of diabetes.
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Content ArticleIn this BMJ article, consultant in geriatrics and acute medicine David Oliver describes his experience of being an inpatient in the hospital he works in. He talks about how his three-day admission with respiratory syncytial virus and pneumococcus has given him a better understanding of what patients experience in hospital. He describes how lack of privacy, poor quality food and noise affected him during his stay as an inpatient. He also highlights that although all staff were professional and kind, they were clearly overworked and unable to focus on more 'minor' concerns that patients have.
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Content ArticleThis webinar hosted by the Patients Association looked at the benefits to patients of accessing their GP health records online, and answered questions from patients about how to access this information.
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Content ArticleHospital at Home is a short-term, targeted intervention that provides a level of acute hospital care in an individual’s own home, or homely setting that is equivalent to that provided within a hospital. In mid-2020, the ihub within Healthcare Improvement Scotland began working with a number of NHS boards and health and social care partnerships to support the implementation of Hospital at Home services across Scotland. This toolkit was created as part of that work, providing a range of tools and resources to support areas to implement and expand Hospital at Home services.
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Content Article
WHO: Post COVID-19 condition (Long Covid)
Sam posted an article in Patient recovery
Factsheet on Long Covid from the World Health Organization. -
Content ArticleA survey of over 4,000 people with long-term conditions on prescription charges has found the charge is a barrier to accessing medicine. The findings come following the UK government's announcement that the prescription charge will rise on 1 April 2023.
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Content ArticleCan you imagine the distress of going to hospital for an operation and having to return to theatre to have forceps removed because they were left inside your abdomen. Or going in for a left hip operation because of years of agonising pain and waking up to find out they had operated on your good hip. Or having surgery to preserve your ovaries — but they are accidentally removed. Or, worst of all, realising you have had a procedure intended for a different patient. Fanciful stories made up for a TV drama? Sadly not. These were just some of the awful mishaps that occurred in hospitals in England over the space of just ten months. Professor Rob Galloway, writing for the Daily Mail, shares his tips on what patients can you do to protect themselves.
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Content ArticleIn this guest post, Michael A. Osborne, Professor of Machine Learning at Oxford's Department of Engineering Science looks at how the medical community is failing to explore the links between Long Covid and ME/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (ME/CFS). He describes the symptoms common to both conditions and highlights the historic lack of funding and attention ME/CFS research and treatment has received.
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Content ArticleIf you are considering 'going private' for the first time, it can be confusing and overwhelming. Private Healthcare Information Network (PHIN) has created some short videos to guide you through your private healthcare journey and demonstrate how the PHIN website and search function can help you. These videos for patients clarify some essential healthcare terms and shows how you can use PHIN's website to make informed decisions when considering private medical treatment. Have a watch, or if you prefer to read the information instead, PHIN has also included the text from each video below it. PHIN is an independent, government-mandated organisation publishing performance and fees information about private consultants and hospitals.
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Content ArticleFalsified, fake or counterfeit medicines are medicines disguising themselves as authentic, and they can pose significant health risks. 96% of websites selling medicines operate illegally–but research suggests that over 50% of people are not aware of this. This blog highlights the issue of counterfeit Parkinson's medications being sold illegally online. Mike Isles, Executive Director of the Alliance for Safe Online Pharmacy in the EU describes their high prevalence and gives tips for people with Parkinson's on how to stay safe when buying medicines online.
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Content ArticleThis editorial in BMJ Quality & Safety argues that patients' perceptions of their safety should not be dismissed when measuring healthcare safety. The authors argue that a differentiation between ‘feeling safe’, as defined through patient experience, and ‘being safe’, as defined through observation and evaluation using clinical outcomes selected by quality experts, creates a power differential and dynamic that degrades the role and value of patient experiences as valid patient safety indicators.
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Content ArticleThis report by the Royal College of General Practitioners (RCGP) sets out recommendations for the Government to tackle the workforce and workload crisis in general practice, and support GPs and their teams to meet the healthcare challenges of the 21st century. Based on a survey of more than 2,600 GPs and other practice team members from across the UK, the report provides a snapshot of what frontline staff have faced during one of the most difficult winters experienced in the NHS, and what they think needs to happen to make general practice more sustainable. Respondents describe a profession in crisis, with unmanageable workload and workforce pressures fuelling an exodus of fully qualified GPs.
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Content Article
This is part of our series of Patient Safety Spotlight interviews, where we talk to people working for patient safety about their role and what motivates them. Isabela shares how her experience of losing her baby daughter to avoidable harm in 2006 led to her involvement in patient safety advocacy. She talks to us about the vital role of patient campaigners in driving the movement to reduce avoidable harm, and why we need to shift from patient inclusion to belonging in order to improve patient safety. -
Event
Endometriosis webinar for patients
Patient Safety Learning posted an event in Community Calendar
Join the British Society for Gynaecological Endoscopy for an endometriosis Q&A session with experts from across the UK. Hosted by Carla Cressy, questions can be put to the panel via the @theBSGE instagram page and the Endometriosis Foundation website. It will cover a wide range of topics from diagnosis to fertility to thoracic and adolescent endometriosis. Register -
Content ArticleA repository of resources aimed at patients and carers which have been co-produced by the Falls and Fragility Fracture Audit Programme (FFFAP) patient and carer panel.
