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Found 2,339 results
  1. News Article
    An 'expanded workforce' will be delivering flu and a potential COVID-19 vaccine, under proposals unveiled by the Government today. The three-week consultation also focuses on a proposal of mass vaccinations against COVID-19 using a yet-to-be-licensed vaccine, if one becomes available this year. The Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) is hoping new legislation could come into effect by October, ahead of the winter season. The consultation proposes to amend the Human Medicine Regulations 2012 to "expand the workforce legally allowed to administer vaccines under NHS and local authority occupational health schemes, so that additional healthcare professionals in the occupational health workforce will be able to administer vaccines". It said this would include 'midwives, nursing associates, operating department practitioners, paramedics, physiotherapists and pharmacists'. The consultation said: "This will help ensure we have the workforce needed to deliver a mass COVID-19 vaccination programme, in addition to delivery of an upscaled influenza programme, in the autumn." The consultation also said that "there is a possibility that both the flu vaccine and the COVID-19 vaccine will be delivered at the same time, and we need to make sure that in this scenario there is sufficient workforce to allow for this". Read full story Source: Pulse, 28 August 2020
  2. News Article
    Hundreds of NHS patients have received personal, specialised care thanks to a new service set up during the coronavirus pandemic. Stroke Connect, a partnership with the NHS and the Stroke Association provides stroke survivors with support and advice in the early days following hospital discharge, without having to leave the house. Experts have said that the new offer is providing a ‘lifeline’ during the pandemic and has helped more than 500 people to rebuild their lives after having a stroke since it launched last month. Patients are contacted for an initial call within a few days of discharge from hospital, from a trained ‘Stroke Association Connector’, an expert in supporting people after stroke. The connector provides reassurance, support with immediate concerns and links the stroke survivor to support they can access in the long-term as part of their recovery journey as well as signposting them to other sources of support. A further call is offered within the month to check in on the stroke survivor’s progress and identify any further support needed. The new service complements existing rehabilitation services and ‘life after stroke’ care, which has continued throughout the pandemic. Read full story Source: NHS England, 31 August 2020
  3. News Article
    A London acute trust has told its staff they may not be paid for time at home self-isolating if it transpires they were not wearing a mask near someone with coronavirus. Staff at Chelsea and Westminster Hospital Foundation Trust were told that if they have to stay at home self-isolating because they were not wearing a mask, that time would have to be taken as annual or unpaid leave. Chief executive Lesley Watts told all staff in an email today, seen by HSJ, that a worker had tested positive for COVID-19, and that four staff members had spent more than 15 minutes with them “without appropriate [personal protective equipment]” and must all now isolate themselves at home for 14 days. The trust considers it “a serious conduct issue not to wear a mask where you are putting colleagues or our patients at risk – this will be dealt with under our formal processes going forward”, Ms Watts said in the email. “If you are sent home to isolate for two weeks because you have not worn a mask, I am now informing you that you will be required to take this as annual or unpaid leave. The four staff members “would not be having to go home to isolate if the use of face masks and social distancing had been in place appropriately”. A Chelsea and Wesminster Hospital spokesman told HSJ: “The guidance around PPE has changed a number of times over the course of the pandemic and we felt it was important to be clear on the trust’s position and to reiterate how seriously we take staff and patient safety." Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 28 August 2020
  4. News Article
    A leaked government report suggests a "reasonable worst case scenario" of 85,000 deaths across the UK this winter due to COVID-19. The document also says while more restrictions could be re-introduced, schools would likely remain open. But it says the report "is a scenario, not a prediction" and the data are subject to "significant uncertainty". However some are critical of the modelling and say some of it is already out of date. The document, which has been seen by BBC Newsnight, was prepared for the government by the Sage scientific advisory group, which aims to help the NHS and local authorities plan services, such as mortuaries and burial services, for the winter months ahead. Read full story Source: BBC News, 29 August 2020
  5. News Article
    Any new and effective Covid vaccine will be given emergency approval for use in the UK and an expanded workforce will be trained to give the injections to immunise as much of the population as possible quickly, the government has said. A change in the law will allow the UK regulator, the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA), to grant temporary approval for a vaccine from October, before it has been given a licence by the European authorities, which would be the normal procedure. The UK will be out of the EU from January and will approve drugs and vaccines without Brussels’ involvement. Ministers say there will be no shortcut on safety or effectiveness, and that any vaccine will be approved for the UK only if it meets the highest standards. The deputy chief medical officer for England, Prof Jonathan Van-Tam, said: “We are making progress in developing COVID-19 vaccines, which we hope will be important in saving lives, protecting healthcare workers and returning to normal in future. “If we develop effective vaccines, it’s important we make them available to patients as quickly as possible but only once strict safety standards have been met. The proposals consulted on today suggest ways to improve access and ensure as many people are protected from Covid-19 and flu as possible without sacrificing the absolute need to ensure that any vaccine used is both safe and effective.” The MHRA has the power to grant an unlicensed medicine or a vaccine temporary authorisation where a product is proven safe and effective and in the best interest of the patient on the basis of available evidence. Read full story Source: The Guardian, 28 August 2020
  6. News Article
    Guidance to protect at-risk healthcare workers in Wales from coronavirus infection has been relaxed, the BBC has learned. A risk assessment tool initially recommended high-risk workers should not work in the parts of a hospital where infection was most likely. But it now says their personal protective equipment (PPE) should be reviewed or duties changed. The Welsh government says this reflects latest data and low infection rates. However, healthcare professionals say the change to the all-Wales COVID-19 workforce risk assessment tool was made without consultation, and are concerned it was done to prevent hospitals from losing frontline staff ahead of a potential second wave of the virus. Mr Amol Pandit, a urologist who helped to design the tool, has written to the Welsh government four times seeking clarity on the basis for the changes, and why no one was made aware of them before the tool was rolled out. "The changes could have been made in order to keep as many healthcare workers on the frontline as possible, which is why I sent a specific list of questions to the Welsh government, so that I could have assurances that it wasn't done for that reason, but for clinical, evidence-based reasons," Mr Pandit said. Mr Pandit believes healthcare workers who fall into the high-risk category and work in environments where aerosol-generating procedures are performed - considered to carry a high risk of transmission of the virus - may not be fully protected by the current version of the tool if PPE supplies fall short and additional safeguarding measures aren't put into place. "The government needs to be absolutely sure that there is adequate PPE and that it is going to be available to everybody - we have to trust them on that," he said Read full story Source: BBC News, 27 August 2020
  7. News Article
    The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved convalescent plasma for emergency use in hospital patients with COVID-19. The announcement on 23 August said that the FDA had concluded that plasma from recovered patients “may be effective” in treating the virus and that the “potential benefits of the product outweigh the known and potential risks.” The move came despite the absence of results from randomised controlled trials, with only a preprint paper on the effects on hospitalised COVID-19 patients being published to date. Experts have warned that although these early findings show promise there is not enough evidence to show that it works. Plasma from recovered patients was approved on a case by case basis by the FDA for people critically ill with COVID-19 in March. Since then more than 70 000 patients have been treated with plasma. Emergency use approval allows clinicians to use unapproved medical products to diagnose, treat, or prevent serious or life threatening diseases or conditions when there are no adequate, approved, and available alternatives. The FDA’s commissioner, Stephen Hahn, said, “I am committed to releasing safe and potentially helpful treatments for covid-19 as quickly as possible in order to save lives. We’re encouraged by the early promising data that we’ve seen about convalescent plasma. The data from studies conducted this year shows that plasma from patients who’ve recovered from covid-19 has the potential to help treat those who are suffering from the effects of getting this terrible virus.” But Martin Landray, professor of medicine and epidemiology at the University of Oxford and lead researcher for the RECOVERY trial, which is comparing treatments for COVID-19, including convalescent plasma for hospital patients, urged caution. He said, “There is a huge gap between theory and proven benefit. That is why randomised clinical trials are so important. At present, we simply don’t know if it works." Read full story Source: BMJ, 25 August 2020
  8. News Article
    COVID-19 death tolls at individual care homes are being kept secret by regulators in part to protect providers’ commercial interests before a possible second coronavirus surge, the Guardian can reveal. England’s Care Quality Commission (CQC) and the Care Inspectorate in Scotland are refusing to make public which homes or providers recorded the most fatalities amid fears it could undermine the UK’s care system, which relies on private operators. In response to freedom of information requests, the regulators said they were worried that the supply of beds and standards of care could be threatened if customers left badly affected operators. The CQC and Care Inspectorate share home-by-home data with their respective governments – but both refused to make it public. Residents’ families attacked the policy, with one bereaved daughter describing it as “ridiculous” and another relative saying deaths data could indicate a home’s preparedness for future outbreaks. “Commercial interest when people’s lives are at stake shouldn’t even be a factor,” said Shirin Koohyar, who lost her father in April after he tested positive for Covid at a west London care home. “The patient is the important one here, not the corporation.” Read full story Source: The Guardian, 27 August 2020
  9. News Article
    England’s test-and-trace system has been hit with fresh problems after there were delays in contacting nearly 2,000 people infected with coronavirus, and one in seven home tests failed to produce a result. An internet outage meant nearly 3,000 more people than usual were transferred to the contact-tracing system after testing positive for COVID-19 in the week ending 19 August. Two-thirds of these people had been tested days or weeks earlier, meaning there was a delay in reaching them and their close contacts when they should have been self-isolating. The proportion of home tests kits failing to produce a result that week rose sharply, from 4% to 15% of the total, equating to more than 18,000 tests. The Department of Health and Social Care figures also show that test and trace failed for a ninth week running to reach its target of contacting 80% of close contacts of people who test positive for COVID-19. Matt Hancock, the health secretary, acknowledged on Thursday that the programme was “not quite there” in reaching that target. He told LBC radio: “One of the challenges is we want to get NHS test and trace up to over 80% of contacts, getting them to self-isolate – we’re at just over 75%, so we’re nearly there but not quite there.” Read full story Source: The Guardian, 27 August 2020
  10. News Article
    At least 6,500 health and care workers may have been infected with coronavirus through their work, including 100 who died, according to data from the Health and Safety Executive (HSE). The regulator told The Independent it was reviewing each case and could launch investigations under the Health and Safety at Work Act if hospitals or care homes are suspected of not taking adequate steps to protect staff from infection. This could result in a hospital or care home being prosecuted. The latest data from the HSE shows between 10 April and 10 August there were a total of 3, 382 healthcare workplace infections, including 50 fatal incidents. In residential care there were 3,168 infections reported to the watchdog with 48 fatal cases. The results of the review, first revealed earlier this month by The Independent, is being kept secret but where a medical examiner finds a worker may have died as a result of a workplace infection the death will have to be reported to the HSE for possible investigation. Coroners may also hold inquests into deaths. It will also make it easier for families to claim compensation from the government’s additional death in service payments of £60,000 which was announced by health secretary Matt Hancock in April. Read full story Source: The Independent, 25 August 2020
  11. News Article
    Scores of MPs and former ministers have urged the prime minister to tackle a backlog in NHS cancer care that threatens to lead to thousands of early deaths over the next decade. More than 100 MPs have written to Boris Johnson after the coronavirus lockdown caused severe disruption to cancer diagnoses and treatments. They have called on him to deliver an emergency boost to treatment capacity. One senior oncologist has claimed that in a worst-case scenario the effects of the pandemic could result in 30,000 excess cancer deaths over the next decade. Read full story (paywalled) Source: The Times, 22 August 2020
  12. News Article
    Nursing homes were put under “constant” pressure to accept patients with coronavirus while being regularly refused treatment from hospitals and GPs for residents who became ill at the height of the Covid crisis, a landmark study has found. The Queen’s Nursing Institute said homes were told hospitals had blanket “no admissions” policies during April and May while GPs and local managers imposed unlawful do not resuscitate orders on residents. The findings have emerged in a survey by the QNI, the world’s oldest nursing charity, which surveyed 163 care home nurses and managers working across the country. Carried out between May and June this year, the study establishes an evidence base of the impact on the sector from coronavirus, in addition to the official figures showing care home death rates. One nurse said they were under “constant pressure to admit people who were Covid positive” while another said: “The acute sector pushed us to take untested admissions. The two weeks of daily deaths during an outbreak were possibly the two worst weeks of my 35-year nursing career.” Read full story Source: The Independent, 22 August 2020
  13. News Article
    Women working in the NHS are suffering from serious stress and exhaustion in the wake of the coronavirus crisis, a troubling new report has found. Some 75% of NHS workers are women and the nursing sector is predominantly made up of women – with 9 out of 10 nurses in the UK being female. The report, conducted by the NHS Confederation’s Health and Care Women Leaders Network, warns the NHS is at risk of losing female staff due to them experiencing mental burnout during the global pandemic. Researchers, who polled more than 1,300 women working across health and care in England, found almost three quarters reported their job had a more damaging impact than usual on their emotional wellbeing due to the COVID-19 emergency. Read full story Source: The Independent, 25 August 2020
  14. News Article
    A home care worker who did not wear protective equipment may have infected a client with a fatal case of coronavirus during weeks of contradictory government guidance on whether the kit was needed or not, an official investigation has found. The government’s confusion about how much protection care workers visiting homes needed is detailed in a report into the death of an unnamed person by the Healthcare Safety Investigation Branch (HSIB), which conducts independent investigations of patient safety concerns in NHS-funded care in England. It was responding to a complaint raised by a member of the public in April. The report shows that Public Health England published two contradictory documents that month. One advised care workers making home visits to wear PPE and the other did not mention the need. The contradiction was not cleared up for six weeks. The government’s guidance had been a shambles that had placed workers and their vulnerable clients at risk, the policy director at the United Kingdom Homecare Association, Colin Angel, said on Wednesday. The association also accused the government of sidelining its expertise and publishing new guidance with little notice, sometimes late on Friday nights, meaning that it was not always noticed by the people it was intended for.
  15. News Article
    The Care Quality Commission (CQC) has taken immediate enforcement action at East Kent Hospitals University Foundation Trust citing “serious concerns” over patient safety. The regulator confirmed it was taking action today after inspectors visited on 12 August following concerns being raised about the standard of care and risk to patients. The CQC confirmed the action had been taken, but it said it could not comment further due to legal restrictions and the trust’s right to appeal the decision. HSJ understands the enforcement action was taken due to concerns over infection prevention control and the number of patients who have contracted COVID-19 in hospital. It is believed to be the first such action against a trust. Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 27 August 2020
  16. News Article
    Hospitals are not equipped to deal with the surge in screenings and tests as the health service restarts care – leaving patients facing delays in diagnosis and treatment for conditions including cancer, according to medical leaders. As the NHS tries to recover from the worst of the coronavirus crisis, more than a million laboratory samples from cancer screening services are expected in pathology labs, while as many as 850,000 delayed CT and MRI scans need to be carried out. But 97% of labs do not have enough pathologists to carry out the work – with staff already working unpaid hours to tackle the existing backlog – while the number of radiology posts nationally would need to be increased by a third to deal with the rise, experts say. Precautions to protect against the spread of coronavirus also limits the number of scans that can be carried out. The royal colleges of pathologists and radiologists warned that cancers would go undiagnosed and treatments for all patients across the NHS could be further delayed as a result. Read full story Source: The Independent, 27 August 2020
  17. News Article
    Obesity may double the risk of falling seriously ill with Covid-19 and increase the chances of dying by almost 50 per cent, according to researchers, who also warned any future vaccine may be less effective for the clinically overweight. Health issues caused by obesity include a number of pre-existing conditions known to exacerbate a Covid-19 infection – including heart disease, diabetes and high blood pressure. Now a global assessment of health data gathered since the start of the the pandemic by researchers at the University of North Carolina has found people with a Body Mass Index (BMI) of more than 30 were 113 per cent more likely to be hospitalised. Those admitted to hospital were found to be 74% more likely to be admitted to an intensive care unit, while the risk of death among obese patients increased by 48%. Read full story Source: The Independent, 26 August 2020
  18. News Article
    Complacency over the flu jab risks overwhelming the NHS, experts warn, as data reveals the scale of the challenge in expanding the vaccination programme. Last month, the government announced plans to double the number of people who receive the influenza jab. But BBC analysis has found the take-up rate among people in vulnerable groups eligible for a free jab has declined. Health secretary Matt Hancock said he did not want a flu outbreak "at the same time as dealing with coronavirus". The government wants to increase the number of people vaccinated from 15 million to 30 million amid fears coronavirus cases will rise again in the autumn. Local authorities in England saw an average 45% of people with serious health conditions under 65 take up the offer of a free vaccine last winter, data shows. That represents a drop from 50% in 2015. The UK government has an ambition to vaccinate 55% of people in vulnerable groups, which includes people with multiple sclerosis (MS), diabetes or chronic asthma. The World Health Organization (WHO) has previously said countries should vaccinate 75% of people in "vulnerable" categories. Read full story Source: BBC News, 27 August 2020
  19. News Article
    A majority of pregnant women who died from coronavirus during the peak of the pandemic were from an ethnic minority background, it has emerged. A new study of more than a dozen women who died between March and May this year also heavily criticised the reorganisation of NHS services which it said contributed to poor care and the deaths of some of the women. This included one woman who was twice denied an intensive care bed because there were none available, as well as women treated by inexperienced staff who had been redeployed by hospitals and who made mistakes in their treatment of the women. The report, by experts at the National Perinatal Epidemiology Unit, based at the University of Oxford, also criticised mental health services after four women died by suicide. The report said women were “bounced” between services which had stopped face-to-face assessments during the crisis. The report looked at 16 women’s deaths in total. Eight women died from COVID-19, seven of whom had an ethnic minority background. Two women with Covid-19 died from unrelated causes, four died by suicide and two were victims of homicide. In the report, published on Thursday, the authors concluded improvements in care could have been made in 13 of the deaths they examined. In six cases, improvements in care could have meant they survived. Read full story Source: The Independent, 21 August 2020
  20. News Article
    Nearly three-quarters of coronavirus patients admitted to hospital suffer ongoing symptoms three months later, new research suggests. A total of 81 patients out of 110 discharged from Southmead Hospital in Bristol were still experiencing symptoms from the virus, including breathlessness, excessive fatigue and muscle aches, after 12 weeks. Many were struggling to carry out daily tasks such as washing, dressing or going back to work, the study found. The majority of patients reported improvements in the initial symptoms of fever, cough and loss of sense of smell, and most had no evidence of lung scarring or reductions in lung function. The findings are part of North Bristol NHS Trust's Discover project, which is studying the longer-term effects of coronavirus - so-called Long COVID. An intensive care doctor, Dr Jake Suett, told Sky News in June that he was still suffering COVID-19 symptoms three months after contracting the disease. Dr Jake Suett, 31, had no underlying health conditions but was still suffering chest pain, breathlessness, blurred vision, memory loss, a high temperature, concentration problems. Dr Rebecca Smith, from North Bristol NHS Trust, said: "There's still so much we don't know about the long-term effects of coronavirus, but this study has given us vital new insight into what challenges patients may face in their recovery and will help us prepare for those needs." Read full story Source: Sky News, 20 August 2020
  21. News Article
    A third of doctors have treated patients with long term COVID-19 symptoms, including chronic fatigue and anosmia, a survey conducted by the BMA has found. Richard Vautrey, chair of the BMA’s GP committee for England, said it was clear that the long term impact of COVID-19 on patients and the NHS would be profound. “With more patients presenting with conditions as the result of infection, it’s essential that sufficient capacity is in place to support and treat them,” Vautrey said. “With the growing backlog of non-COVID-19 treatment, the likelihood of a season flu outbreak, and the possibility of a second wave of infections we need to see a more comprehensive long term plan to enable doctors to care for their patients this winter and beyond.” The survey also asked doctors about their own experiences of COVID-19: 63% said they did not believe they had contracted the virus, 12% had had a diagnosis of COVID-19 confirmed by testing, and 14% believed they had been infected with the virus. David Strain, co-chair of the BMA’s medical academic staff committee, said that the NHS could not afford more failures of quality and supply in personal protective equipment. “Risk assessments should be available to all working in the NHS and appropriate steps should be put in place to mitigate the risk of catching the virus, even in those that have a low risk of a bad outcome from the initial infection,” he said. Read full story Source: BMJ, 13 August 2020
  22. News Article
    The number of adults experiencing depression has almost doubled during the pandemic, according to new figures. Data from the Office for National Statistics showed that almost one in five adults (19.2 per cent) were likely to be experiencing some form of depression in June. This had risen from around one in 10 (9.7%) between July 2019 and March 2020, before the imposition of the nationwide lockdown. Dame Til Wykes, a professor of clinical psychology and rehabilitation at King’s College London, warned of a looming “mental health crisis” once the pandemic passes. “This study tells us, yet again, that we might have a mental health crisis after this pandemic. The social effects of distancing and isolation for some affects their emotional wellbeing. Dr Billy Boland, chairman of the General Adult Faculty at the Royal College of Psychiatrists, said the UK’s mental health services would be faced with a “tsunami of referrals” in the coming months. “Isolation, bereavement and financial insecurity are some of the reasons why the nation’s mental health has deteriorated since the start of the pandemic. “The government must speed up the investment to mental health services if we are to treat the growing numbers of people living with depression and other mental illnesses.” Read full story Source: The Independent, 18 August 2020
  23. News Article
    Thousands of patients with cancer have had chemotherapy delivered to their doors so that they can more safely receive treatment during the coronavirus pandemic. Up to 10,000 chemo home deliveries were made over three months at the peak of the outbreak, avoiding the need for patients to venture out and risk infection when their immune system was low. The drops are part of the COVID-friendly treatments introduced in response to the pandemic which have helped to ensure that 85,000 people could start treatment between March and June, with latest data showing referrals beginning to recover to pre-pandemic levels. NHS staff, including community nurses and pharmacists, and volunteers have been dropping off the life-saving medication – they step back two metres when they arrive at a patient’s house, identify them and make sure they have everything they need. Hospitals have also significantly increased the use of chemo at home, with local pharmacy teams and community nurses providing the service to reduce cancer patients’ risk of exposure to the virus. The action joins a series of measures, including the rollout of COVID protected cancer hubs for treatment and introducing ‘COVIDfriendly’ cancer drugs. NHS England is spending £160 million on drugs that mean patients do not have to go to hospitals for regular checks and treatment. Dame Cally Palmer, director of cancer for the NHS in England said: “NHS staff have treated more than 108,000 patients requiring specialist hospital care for COVID-19 while also keeping other vital services such as cancer, maternity and A&E running throughout the pandemic. “The NHS has also fast tracked modern, more convenient services that help to keep patients and staff safe – from video consultations to chemotherapy delivered to patients’ doors – that have allowed 85,000 people to start cancer treatment during the pandemic.” Read full story Source: NHS Improvement, 17 August 2020
  24. News Article
    Nurses and non-medical staff have been stopped from taking patient calls to the NHS coronavirus helpline amid concerns over the safety of their advice. An audit of calls to the telephone assessment service found more than half were potentially unsafe for patients, according to a leaked email shared with The Independent. At least one patient may have come to harm as a result of the way their assessment was handled. The COVID-19 Clinical Assessment Service (CCAS) is a branch of the NHS 111 phone line and is designed to assess patients showing signs of coronavirus to determine whether they need to be taken to hospital or seen by a GP. The helpline was set up at the start of the pandemic to divert patients with symptoms to a phone-based triage to relieve pressure on GPs and prevent them from turning up at surgeries and spreading the virus. GPs, nurses and allied health professionals (AHPs) such as paramedics and physiotherapists were recruited to speak to patients after they were flagged by NHS 111 call handlers. The use of non-medical staff was first paused in July amid concerns about the quality of call handling. Now it has emerged much wider safety issues have surfaced. Read full story Source: The Independent, 18 August 2020
  25. News Article
    Coronavirus patients who have lived with symptoms for up to five months have spoken about the huge impact it has had on their lives. "Long Covid" support groups have appeared on social media and the government says "tens of thousands" of people have long-term problems after catching the virus, such as extreme fatigue. Daliah, from Borehamwood, Hertfordshire, said: "It's scary because we don't know how permanent this is. There are times where I feel like life will never be normal again, my body will never be normal again." The NHS has launched a Your Covid Recovery website to offer support and advice to people affected. See video here
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