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Showing results for tags 'Secondary impact'.
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News Article
Missed vaccinations could lead to other fatal outbreaks, doctors warn
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
Senior doctors fear that thousands of routine vaccination appointments may be missed or delayed because of the coronavirus lockdown, raising the risk of sudden and potentially fatal outbreaks of other diseases when restrictions on movement are finally eased. GPs and accident and emergency departments have witnessed unprecedented falls in the numbers of people seeking medical care in recent weeks, prompting concerns that vital routine immunisations for infections such as measles, mumps, rubella, tetanus and whooping cough are falling by the wayside. “We are very concerned. There are no data yet because we have only been in lockdown for a month, but there are plenty of anecdotes from practice nurses and others saying they have noticed a decline in vaccine uptake,” said Helen Bedford, a professor of children’s health at the UCL Great Ormond Street Institute of Child Health and member of the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health’s health promotion committee. Read full story Source: The Guardian, 26 April 2020 -
News Article
My A&E department is eerily quiet. I'm worried the very sick are staying away
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
"I have never seen my A&E department so still, so well-staffed and so uncannily calm," says Steven Fabes, an A&E doctor. Attendances in A&E departments across the country are down, in some cases by up to 80%. There is an obvious reason for the calm: people are not out and about. Pedestrians are not walking out in front of cyclists. Cyclists are not diving over car bonnets. Asthmatics are not wheezing through the fumes of Oxford Street. But there is something more worrying at play, too – people who need us are not coming in. "I am worried that people who need us are not coming in, scared that hospitals are vectors for infection rather than cure," says Steven. Read full story Source: The Guardian, 23 April 2020 -
Content Article
This blog is written in time for the WHO's World Immunisation Week. It explores vaccination programmes, in particular that for COVID-19 – it's uptake, both in the UK and globally, and the negative impact the pandemic has had on vaccination programmes for other diseases. -
Content Article
HSJ Primer: Breaking point (25 April 2022)
Patient Safety Learning posted an article in Workforce and resources
Recently the Financial Times health and data reports produced an incisive piece showing the world what is all too readily apparent to people in the NHS: bed capacity has been stretched to breaking point. The report said this “calls into question [the NHS’s] ability to meet a commitment to increase non-urgent hospital treatment by 30 per cent above pre-pandemic levels over the next three years”. It also demonstrates the dangerous congestion that is causing ambulances to stack up outside emergency departments and medically fit patients to languish in vital beds past their due time for discharge. This congestion is causing dangerous delays, leading to a rising number of serious incidents in ambulances queuing to get to the front door of the ED. There is doubtless much that can be done inside hospitals to improve efficiency, alleviate bottlenecks and improve patient flow. -
Content ArticleRemote, at-home patient monitoring was widely used during the Covid-19 pandemic due to lack of hospital beds. This article in JAMA Network looks at the benefits of remote monitoring and how it can be used safely. Studies have shown that the use of remote telemonitoring reduced length of hospitalisation for Covid patients requiring oxygen, and the number of patient visits to emergency departments. The authors look at how the combined use of telehealth, home health and remote monitoring could bring hospital-level–monitoring services to patients in their home, and what barriers need to be overcome to achieve this.
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Content ArticleDiabetes UK are calling on government for a recovery plan to tackle 'devastating’ diabetes care delays – before it’s too late Diabetes is serious and people living with diabetes have been ‘pushed to the back of the queue’ during the coronavirus pandemic and a national recovery plan is needed to support front-line healthcare teams in getting vital services back on track. Diabetes UK warn that despite the tireless efforts of the NHS through the pandemic, many people living with the condition are still struggling to access the care they need, putting them at risk of serious complications, which can lead to premature death. This new report published by Diabetes UK as part of our Diabetes Is Serious campaign, shows the scale of the problem and sets out a series of calls to UK Government to tackle it.
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Content ArticleAfter two years under siege from COVID, many nurses in the United States are reconsidering the profession.
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Content ArticleRecovering services from the covid crisis is the big task for NHS leaders for the foreseeable future. HSJ's Recovery Watch newsletter tracks prospects and progress. This week HSJ bureau chief and performance lead James Illman discusses virtual wards and why staffing pressures are ‘likely to be under-estimated’ and are a patient safety risk.
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Content ArticleThis Health Foundation long read explores how the NHS in England can better use routine health data to help address current challenges, including winter pressures, the ongoing coronavirus response and the growing elective care backlog. It examines the longstanding barriers to widespread use of data and data science, consider what actions might help to overcome these, and explore whether the data strategy for health and social care will deliver the change needed.
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Content ArticleSweden was well equipped to prevent the pandemic of COVID-19 from becoming serious. Over 280 years of collaboration between political bodies, authorities, and the scientific community had yielded many successes in preventive medicine. Sweden’s population is literate and has a high level of trust in authorities and those in power. During 2020, however, Sweden had ten times higher COVID-19 death rates compared with neighbouring Norway. In this report, Nele Brusselaers et al. try to understand why, using a narrative approach to evaluate the Swedish COVID-19 policy and the role of scientific evidence and integrity. We argue that that scientific methodology was not followed by the major figures in the acting authorities—or the responsible politicians—with alternative narratives being considered as valid, resulting in arbitrary policy decisions.
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Content ArticleThis is the report and formal minutes of a House of Commons Public Accounts Committee session that examined the issues surrounding NHS backlogs and waiting times in England. The session particularly focused on accountability in how NHS England and the Department for Health and Social Care manage workforce and resources. At the end of December 2021, 6.07 million patients were waiting for elective care, the biggest waiting list since records began. Only 64% (3.87 million) of these patients had been waiting for less than 18 weeks, compared with the performance standard which requires 92% to have been waiting for less than 18 weeks. Similarly, in December 2021, only 67% of patients with an urgent referral for suspected cancer were treated within 62 days compared with a requirement for 85% to be treated within that time. The report highlights that although the Covid-19 pandemic had a significant effect on the backlog, NHS waiting time performance had declined steadily in the years before the pandemic.
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Content Article
NHS My Planned Care Patient Platform
Patient Safety Learning posted an article in Other health and care software
My Planned Care gives you advice and support while you wait and helps you to prepare for your hospital consultation, treatment, or surgery. This includes giving you information about waiting times at your hospital and other supporting and local services while you wait. This site is updated weekly and can be viewed by anyone, which means you, your family or carer as well as your NHS team can all see the latest information. Your hospital team will be in touch with you as soon as they can. If you are looking for an update, please check this website before contacting your hospital or GP. -
Content ArticleMedical research is progressing to clarify the full range of sub-acute and long-term effects of post-COVID-19 syndrome (Long Covid), but most manuscripts published to date only analyse the effects in patients discharged from hospital, which may induce significant bias. This Spanish study in the journal Scientific Reports aimed to analyse the single and multiple associations between post-COVID-19 characteristics with up to six months of follow-up in hospitalised and non-hospitalised Covid-19 patients. Key findings include: At six months follow-up, fatigue, arthralgia, fever, breathlessness, emotional disturbance, depression, cognitive deficit, haemoglobin, total bilirubin, and ferritin are correlated with the gender of the patient Patients with previous respiratory diseases and abnormal body mass index, ex-smoker, and dyspnoea had a robust statistically significant association. Non-hospitalised patients may suffer more severe thromboembolic events and fatigue than hospitalised patients. Functional lung tests are good predictors of chest CT imaging abnormalities in elderly patients with Long Covid.
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Content Article
BMA NHS backlog data analysis
Patient-Safety-Learning posted an article in Coronavirus (COVID-19)
This webpage from the British Medical Association (BMA) contains analysis of NHS data and is updated monthly. It highlights the growing backlogs across the NHS and includes operations data and information on the cancer waiting list, GP referrals and A&E waiting times. -
Content Article
Eating disorders: challenges of the pandemic
Dr Joanna Silver posted an article in Eating disorders
This week is Eating Disorders Awareness Week. Eating disorders are complex mental health conditions. People with eating disorders use food as a way of managing difficult feelings and maintaining control, particularly when life seems uncontrollable. In March 2020, the world changed in a blink of an eye when the COVID-19 pandemic struck. Dr Joanna Silver, Counselling Psychologist, discusses the additional challenges the pandemic brought for many people with eating disorders. -
Content ArticleThe COVID-19 pandemic placed unprecedented pressure on councils and care providers. A new report from the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman analyses just how those organisations coped.
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Content ArticleThe Covid-19 pandemic has had a significant impact on people’s mental health, and the knock-on effect is putting services and organisations under considerable pressure. In this briefing for the NHS Confederation, Paula Lavis outlines the case for change in mental health services and makes recommendations on how to address the increasing post-pandemic demand. The briefing covers the following areas: Increased severity of mental health problems linked to the pandemic The wider social context The case for change: Prevention and easy access to mental health support, Funding, Workforce Viewpoint and recommendations
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Content ArticleAlthough the direct effects of Covid-19 on children and young people are usually milder than for older age groups, the pandemic’s effect on the overall health and care of the youngest generation has nonetheless been extensive. This analysis from the Nuffield Trust looks at the impact Covid-19 has had on healthcare for children and young people. The review has looked at both physical and mental health services and come to the same conclusion - support has been badly disrupted and the plight of children overlooked.
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Content ArticleWaiting is a feature of public healthcare systems but must be managed to avoid adverse impacts on patients. The NHS sets performance standards for waiting times for elective and cancer care. Its performance against these was deteriorating before the COVID-19 pandemic and has worsened since it began. Millions of patients’ care was disrupted, meaning backlogs increased. This report looks in detail at backlogs and waiting times for elective and cancer care in the NHS in England. It explains how the current increased backlogs and waiting times have arisen, including the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. The report sets out: how waiting times performance for elective and cancer care are tracked in the NHS, and how long patients have been waiting relative to the performance standards; the causes of increasing longer waits before the pandemic and the disruption caused by the pandemic; and the steps the Department and NHSE&I have already taken to address the increasing backlogs and waiting times, and the constraints and challenges the NHS faces in making a full recovery.
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Content ArticleThis publication by National Voices, the leading coalition of health and social care charities in England, highlights the factors currently affecting timely access to care for people living with ill health, disability or impairment. It calls for system leaders to prioritise rebuilding timely access to health and care, and to take an approach that considers the whole system and its context and the whole person and their circumstances.
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Content ArticleThe COVID-19 pandemic resulted in an unprecedented reduction in the delivery of surgical services worldwide, especially in non-urgent, non-cancer procedures. A prolonged period without operating (or ‘layoff period’) can result in surgeons experiencing skill fade (both technical and non-technical) and a loss of confidence. While senior surgeons in the UK may be General Medical Council (GMC) validated and capable of performing a procedure, a loss of ‘currency’ may increase the risk of error and intraoperative patient harm, particularly if unexpected or adverse events are encountered. Dual surgeon operating may mitigate risks to patient safety as surgeons regain currency while returning to non-urgent operating and may also be beneficial after the greatly reduced activity observed during the COVID-19 pandemic for low-volume complex operations. In addition, it could be a useful tool for annual appraisal, sharing updated surgical techniques and helping team cohesion. This paper explores lessons from aviation, a leading industry in human factors principles, for regaining surgical skills currency. We discuss real and perceived barriers to dual surgeon operating including finance, training, substantial patient waiting lists, and intraoperative power dynamics.
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Content ArticleIn this article, Dr Ivan Ramos-Galvez, Consultant in Pain Medicine at the Royal Berkshire Hospital, discusses the physical and psychological issues that can arise following surgery for pelvic mesh implants. Dr Ramoz-Galvez highlights that around a third of reported complications are systemic symptoms such as runny nose, muscle pain, brain fog and lethargy, which may be the result of a chronic inflammatory state within the body. Their link to pelvic mesh implants is suggested by the fact that many women report that these symptoms resolve after their implant is removed. He also discusses the wide-ranging impact of pelvic mesh side effects for women who experience them, highlighting that the consequences are not only physical, but also psychological, social and financial. He calls for the medical profession to recognise this and develop treatments that cover all aspects of pelvic mesh complications.
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Content ArticleAs a growing number of hospitals pressed for resources due to the COVID-19 surge suspend elective surgeries, some healthcare professionals want the public to know exactly how important an "elective" procedure can be. The term "elective surgery" does not describe the acuity of the medical condition or necessity of the procedure. Rather, the use of "elective" distinguishes these surgeries that are scheduled in advance from emergency surgeries, such as trauma cases. As Americans learn of elective surgeries once again being postponed, physicians are taking to the web to debunk what can be a misnomer.
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Content ArticleQuotes from US doctors on the impact the pandemic has had on their hospitals and the care they are providing.
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Content ArticleThe pandemic has severely disrupted cancer services in England with major consequences for survival rates for lung, breast and colorectal cancer. This paper from the Institute for Public Policy Research examines the impact of the pandemic on cancer pathways, highlighting widespread disruption across screening, referrals, diagnostic and treatment services. The authors also highlight that the 'missing patient' backlog is difficult to predict and that there is a lack of qualified staff to increase capacity and aid service recovery.
