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Found 814 results
  1. News Article
    Clinical care for sufferers of endometriosis is not meeting "base level", according to new research seen by BBC Scotland. The debilitating condition affects 100,000 women in Scotland and is more common than diabetes, yet it takes eight and a half years to be diagnosed. Almost half of those with endometriosis are in pain most days. The study, commissioned as part of the Scottish government's Women's Health Plan, found that services were lacking. The charity Endometriosis UK said the condition costs the UK economy £8.2bn each year in treatment, healthcare costs and loss of work. It carried out the study and has recommended four main areas for improvement: Implementing National Institute for Health and Care Excellence guidelines and quality standards on endometriosis care across Scotland - the research found that this base level of care "is not currently being met". Building relationships between healthcare services through managed clinical networks to allow for smoother referrals. Increasing education in primary and secondary care levels - including GPs and non-specialist gynaecologists. Investment in a public health campaign and improved menstrual education in schools. Read full story Source: BBC News, 23 January 2022
  2. News Article
    Women are being forced to wait longer for operations and healthcare appointments in the wake of the pandemic, according to a new report. Research carried out by the Care Quality Commission, England’s regulator of health and social care, found 53% of women experienced longer waiting times for appointments or healthcare procedures during the Covid crisis. The report also found 3 in 10 women experienced appointment cancellations. More women report grappling with these issues than men – with some 44% of men saying they have experienced longer waiting times for appointments or procedures. Helena Mckeown, a GP who previously specialised in women’s health at the British Medical Association (BMA), told The Independent she is not surprised by the findings. "Our world is full of sexism and we know of other examples of sexism and biases in healthcare. Some of them are racial biases. To stop unconscious biases, they need to be recognised and addressed. Ms Mckeown, one of the directors of the Menopause Expert Group, a non-profit which provides education about menopause, said female patients are treated differently to men. She added: “We need to make sure we are not taking women saying they are in pain differently to men saying they are in pain. It is really important that we address this problem of women waiting longer for operations and appointments.” Read full story Source: The Independent, 22 January 2022
  3. News Article
    The Irish Cabinet has approved general indemnity cover and product liability cover for claims to two public sector bodies relating to transvaginal mesh products and the Gardasil HPV vaccine. The Health Minister Stephen Donnelly brought forward a proposal to Cabinet Wednesday for the provision of this cover to the Irish Blood Transfusion Service (IBTS) and the Mental Health Commission (MHC) for claims relating to the mesh products or Gardasil. Gardasil is a type of vaccine used to protect against HPV. Vaginal mesh devices have been used in operations to treat stress urinary incontinence and pelvic organ prolapse; two conditions that can impact women after natural childbirth or in their later years. Including the bodies in the State’s general indemnity scheme for these claims will eliminate the requirement for them to carry private insurance. The State Claims Agency was consulted and indicated that it supports the inclusion of both bodies under the scheme. The clinical indemnity scheme indemnifies hospitals but is confined to clinical acts and/or omissions and doesn’t cover product liability matters. Current legal cases around transvaginal mesh products involve allegations in relation to the product itself and allegations of clinical negligence. It has now been proposed to delegate the product liability claims for mesh products to the State Claims Agency to ensure hospitals aren’t exposed to uninsured liability. Thousands of women across the world have suffered complications after having a vaginal mesh device implanted. These complications include chronic pain and recurrent urinary tract infections and have been life-changing in many cases. Read full story Source: thejournal.ie, 19 January 2022
  4. News Article
    A cervical cancer patient has been treated with the aid of artificial intelligence (AI) for the first time in the UK. Emma McCormick, 44, was treated at the St Luke's Cancer Centre in Guildford, Surrey. The Royal Surrey NHS Foundation Trust treated Ms McCormick, who is from West Sussex, using adaptive radiotherapy. The AI technology uses daily CT scans to target the specific areas that need radiotherapy. This helps to avoid damage to healthy tissue and limit side-effects, the hospital said. Patients are given treatments lasting between 20 and 25 minutes, although Ms McCormick's was slightly longer as she was the first patient, a hospital spokesman said. Ms McCormick received five AI-guided treatments per week for five weeks before having a further two weeks of brachytherapy. She said: "If it works for me, and they get information from me, it can help somebody else. It definitely worked and did what it was meant to do and so hopefully that helps others." Dr Alex Stewart, who treated Ms McCormick, said one of the benefits of the treatment was that it allowed for more precision, meaning there were fewer side-effects for the patients. Read full story Source: BBC News, 21 January 2022
  5. News Article
    Changes in cervical cancer screenings will help save lives, not put them at risk, according to a top gynaecologist. Prof Alison Fiander said people should not be worried screenings have dropped from every three to every five years in Wales as tests are "more effective". Public Health Wales (PHW) said the new rules were for people aged 25 to 49. More than 1.2 million people backed calls for a rethink in a UK petition and politicians in Wales will debate it after 30,000 signed a Senedd petition. Women and people with a cervix - as it could also affect trans men too - who had not tested positive for human papillomavirus (HPV) will now wait two more years between tests. Health chiefs in Wales said they changed the interval between screenings to the same time as those in Scotland because tests are now more accurate. Cervical screening gaps in England and Northern Ireland remain at three years. But Wales' public health body did publicly apologise for causing "concern", and admitted health chiefs "hadn't done enough to explain the changes". Prof Fiander, a clinical lead at the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, said PHW had "missed an opportunity" to help educate people but reassured the public the change was safe and not a cost-cutting exercise. Read full story Source: BBC News, 18 January 2022
  6. News Article
    An urgent debate has been called in the Senedd over a move to extend routine cervical screenings in Wales from every three years to five years. Public Health Wales (PHW) said those aged 25-49 who had not tested positive for human papillomavirus (HPV) would now wait two more years between tests. PHW said it was because the screening tests are now more accurate. However, 30,000 people signed a petition against it, citing the risk it could cause an increase in deaths. Particularly concerned are those who have not received the HPV vaccine, a national immunisation programme for which began in 2008 for girls aged 12 to 13. The number of signatures on the official petition on the Welsh Parliament's website was more than enough to trigger the issue to be looked at. The change follows a recommendation from the UK National Screening Committee. Last week, Public Health Wales apologised for causing "concern" over how it explained changes to screenings following its announcement. Read full story Source: BBC News, 10 January 2022
  7. News Article
    Pregnant women are being urged not to delay getting their Covid jab or booster in a government campaign. More than 96% of pregnant women admitted to hospital with Covid symptoms between May and October last year were unvaccinated, according to the UK Obstetric Surveillance System. The campaign will share testimonies of pregnant women who have had the jab on radio and social media. The government said the vaccine was safe and had no impact on fertility. In December, the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation added pregnant women to the priority list for the vaccine, saying they were at heightened risk from Covid. Around one in five pregnant women admitted to hospital with the virus needed to be delivered pre-term to help them recover, and one in five of their babies needed care in the neonatal unit, the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) said. Prof Lucy Chappell, chief scientific adviser to the DHSC, told BBC Radio 4's Today programme that a third of unvaccinated pregnant women with COVID-19 needed help with breathing and one in six were admitted to intensive care. "We've also seen stillbirths and neonatal deaths in the latest wave," she said. Prof Chappell said the vaccine causes pregnant women to produce antibodies against the virus, which cross over to their babies and give them protection too. Dr Jen Jardine, from the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, who is seven months pregnant and has had her booster jab, said: "Both as a doctor and pregnant mother myself, we can now be very confident that the Covid-19 vaccinations provide the best possible protection for you and your unborn child against this virus." Read full story Source: BBC News, 10 January 2022
  8. News Article
    Women who are operated on by a male surgeon are much more likely to die, experience complications and be readmitted to hospital than when a woman performs the procedure, research reveals. Women are 15% more liable to suffer a bad outcome, and 32% more likely to die, when a man rather than a woman carries out the surgery, according to a study of 1.3 million patients. The findings have sparked a debate about the fact that surgery in the UK remains a hugely male-dominated area of medicine and claims that “implicit sex biases” among male surgeons may help explain why women are at such greater risk when they have an operation. “In our 1.3 million patient sample involving nearly 3,000 surgeons we found that female patients treated by male surgeons had 15% greater odds of worse outcomes than female patients treated by female surgeons,” said Dr Angela Jerath, an associate professor and clinical epidemiologist at the University of Toronto in Canada and a co-author of the findings. “This result has real-world medical consequences for female patients and manifests itself in more complications, readmissions to hospital and death for females compared with males. “We have demonstrated in our paper that we are failing some female patients and that some are unnecessarily falling through the cracks with adverse, and sometimes fatal, consequences.” Read full story Source: The Guardian, 4 January 2022
  9. News Article
    Ministers have pledged to “reset the dial” on women’s health to tackle decades of gender inequality in England, with plans to appoint a women’s health tsar, eradicate medical taboos, boost menopause support and ban harmful “virginity repair” operations. The Department of Health and Social Care has published its Vision for Women’s Health strategy after 100,000 women came forward to share their healthcare concerns. Maria Caulfield, the minister for women’s health, described some of their experiences as “shocking”. The vision document sets out initial government commitments on women’s health, recognising that “systemwide changes” are needed to tackle “decades of gender health inequality”. The final plan – the Women’s Health Strategy – will be published in spring 2022. On Wednesday night, ministers pledged to introduce legislation criminalising hymenoplasty or any procedure to rebuild or repair the hymen. Such surgery creates scar tissue so that a woman will bleed the next time she has intercourse, making it appear she has never had sex. Young women can be forced to prove they are “pure” on their wedding night. Doctors have called for a ban on the surgery for years, saying it can never be justified on health grounds and is harmful. Separately, the government will appoint a women’s health ambassador to raise the profile of key issues and boost awareness of taboo topics. Ministers will also establish a UK-wide menopause taskforce to investigate how women going through the menopause can be better supported. The cost of hormone replacement therapy (HRT) prescriptions will also be cut by implementing longer prescribing cycles so women will need fewer prescriptions and therefore pay less. The consultation provided “stark and sobering insights” into women’s experiences of health and care and highlighted entrenched problems within the NHS, officials said. Ministers are also considering compulsory training for GPs on women’s health after the idea was raised by women who came forward. The vision document said: “We also heard about a lack of awareness amongst some GPs of the causes of infertility, miscarriages and their relationship with infertility, and the reasons for in vitro fertilisation (IVF) failure.” Read full story Source: The Guardian, 22 December 2021 Related reading Gender bias: A threat to women’s health (August 2020) Dangerous exclusions: The risk to patient safety of sex and gender bias Patient Safety Learning: Women’s Health Strategy Consultation Response
  10. News Article
    Women in prison are five times more likely to have a stillbirth and twice as likely to give birth to a premature baby that needs special care, new data collected by the Observer shows. Following two baby deaths in prisons since 2019 there have been increasing concerns about safety for pregnant women and their babies. Figures obtained through freedom of information requests made to 11 NHS trusts serving women’s prisons in England show 28% of the babies born to women serving a custodial sentence between 2015 and 2019 were admitted to a neonatal unit afterwards – double the national figure, according to data from the National Neonatal Research Database. The findings come as the House of Lords prepares to vote this week on proposed changes to bail and sentencing laws that would improve the rights of pregnant women and mothers facing criminal charges. A report published in September examined the circumstances of a baby’s death at Bronzefield prison in Surrey where an 18-year-old was left to give birth alone in her cell. When Anita rang her cell bell at 5.30am when she went into labour the guards said they would send somebody. It was only during the morning rounds at 7.30am that a nurse was called. She was transferred to hospital at 10.30am. Anita said: “Despite being in active labour the guards would not remove my handcuffs and ignored me when I asked them to call the baby’s father and my mum – who were eventually contacted by a doctor.” Read full story Source: The Guardian, 5 December 2021
  11. News Article
    Women requiring the surgical removal of mesh implants have said "very little" has happened since a landmark Scottish government announcement in the summer. The pledge means patients can now receive free treatment from specialists in America and England. But campaigners said initial assessments in Glasgow were taking up to two years. The Scottish government said it was working with NHS Specialist Services to improve waiting times. Implant use was stopped in Scotland after hundreds of women were left with painful, life-changing side effects. In July, the Scottish government announced surgery and travel costs to Spire Health Care in Bristol and the Mercy Hospital in Missouri in the United States would be covered. The cost of each procedure is estimated to be £16,000 to £23,000. Marian Kenny, who is waiting on surgery to remove a mesh implant. joined the protest outside the New Victoria Hospital and admitted she felt "deflated" by the lack of progress in recent months. She told BBC Scotland: "For so much of this fight, we have been fighting to get it stopped and this is the only time we have been fighting for ourselves. We don't want to be guinea pigs any more." Health Secretary Humza Yousaf acknowledged the pain, suffering and distress mesh survivors have been through. He said he hoped to finalise contracts with the clinics in Bristol and Missouri "as quickly as we possibly can". Mr Yousaf added: "I would hope to have an update relatively soon. "I know they have been waiting too long and I promise them I don't want them to be waiting any longer than they have to." Read full story Source: BBC News, 24 November 2021
  12. News Article
    Women who experience bleeding in early pregnancy and have had at least one miscarriage should be treated with the hormone progesterone. The new guidance, from the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE), is based on research suggesting the treatment could lead to 8,450 more births each year in the UK. The more miscarriages a woman had, the more effective progesterone was, the trial found. The naturally occurring hormone helps prepare the womb for the growing baby. About one in five women experience bleeding, or spotting as it is sometimes called, in the first 12 weeks of pregnancy. It often causes no problems but they are advised to have it checked out with their doctor or midwife to be sure. Some may experience a "threatened miscarriage", where bleeding continues along with the pregnancy. Most are told to go home and wait and see what happens next. The new (NICE) guidance recommends inserting progesterone pessaries into the vagina twice a day. A trial carried out by researchers at the Tommy's National Centre for Miscarriage Research which the new guidance is based on, found that progesterone didn't make much of a difference for women who just had bleeding and no previous miscarriages. But the more miscarriages a woman had suffered, the more effective progesterone was. One of those behind the Tommy's National Centre for Miscarriage Research research, Prof Arri Coomarasamy, from the University of Birmingham, said: "This is a very significant moment. "We have an intervention that works that can stop a miscarriage. This gives hope to thousands of couples throughout UK." "But it's really important to appreciate that only some miscarriages can be prevented by progesterone." "There are other causes for miscarriages." "We still need to study them. We need to find other effective treatment." Read full story Source: BBC News, 24 November 2021
  13. News Article
    Thousands of women are being missed off the breast implant registry, new figures suggest. Data from NHS Digital, which manages the register, implies that around 8500 women across England and Scotland have not been added to the register after they were fitted with an implant last year. The register was recommended as a result of the breast implant scandal which saw some women fitted with faulty implants. It records the details of every person who has breast implant surgery in case of a product recall or another safety concern. But the latest figures suggest that many are being missed off the register and NHS Digital has asked women undergoing such treatment to ensure their surgeon has registered their details. The figures show that operations on 10,500 people were recorded in 2020. But officials have estimated this represents around 55% of the total number of cases. This means that approximately 8485 people were not added. Lee Martin, NHS breast surgeon and chairman of the Breast and Cosmetic Implant Registry steering group, said: "We want all patients, past and present, to be aware that the registry exists and ensure they are included by speaking to their surgeons." "As a surgeon, I know first-hand the importance of patient information being included on the registry, it's crucial in providing good patient care and provides patients with assurance that they will be followed up with if there are issues with their breast implants in the future." Read full story Source: Medscape, 10 November 2021
  14. News Article
    The shortage of hormone replacement therapy (HRT) in Northern Ireland is distressing for women and challenging for pharmacies trying to access it, according to a community pharmacist. Loretto McManus advised women to leave plenty of time for ordering their prescriptions. The Health and Social Care Board said there were "some treatments which are currently experiencing supply issues". HRT helps many women control their often difficult menopausal symptoms. There is a national shortage of HRT with officials citing several reasons including manufacturing delays, an increase in demand and possibly Brexit. Ms McManus said certain products were out of stock in pharmacies across Northern Ireland and that this was "distressing" for women who have become used to particular treatments. "As a community pharmacist the utmost care of our patients is premium to us," she said. "Trying to source the prescribed product in a timely manner for the patient can be challenging." Several women have told BBC News NI that they were being offered substitutes or had to source the medication themselves. Kathryn Schreuder, part of a Northern Ireland menopause support group, said: "For a lot of women, their concern is, if their medication isn't available and they have just maybe spent six months to a year getting the right level of what they need, for that suddenly to be changed because of the limitation of what is available is very distressing." Read full story Source: BBC News, 7 November 2021
  15. News Article
    The High Court in Canberra, Australia, has ruled against big pharma giants Johnson and Johnson's application to appeal the Federal Court’s decision in favour of the survivors of their defective medical devices in November 2019. This means the decision of the Full Federal Court, in favour of the Lead Applicant and group members, will stand. Shine Lawyers', which has led the class action, has launched further actions against American Medical Systems (AMS), another manufacturer of mesh and tape implants supplied in Australia. The AMS implants, which are used to treat pelvic organ prolapse and stress urinary incontinence, have left many Australian women with severe complications. The legal group has also moved against Boston Scientific for defective vaginal mesh and sling implants received by women in Australia and opened a second Ethicon / Johnson & Johnson’s on behalf of women implanted with a defective mesh product on or after 4 July 2017. The class actions were filed in the Federal court and MIA believe other class actions, including hernia mesh, are underway. Kath Sansom, founder of the Sling the Mesh campaign, said "Brilliant news from Australia! Johnson & Johnson Loses High Court Appeal against the pelvic mesh verdict of 2019. This means J&J can no longer appeal the verdict! I realise compensation may still take time to be awarded to the 10,000+ mesh injured but at least the appeals are over! Congratulations to all the Australian mesh campaigners!" Read press release
  16. News Article
    "What has happened to us is home-grown, institutionalised female genital mutilation," says Mary Lodato, 63, a mother of three and a university researcher, from Kettering in Northamptonshire. "It has been a systemic failure in health and care and it was totally avoidable." What Mary is referring to are complications due to implanted surgical mesh, designed to treat post-childbirth pelvic damage in women, which has left thousands effectively crippled as the material disintegrated inside their bodies, and sheared into the tissue, causing a range of devastating symptoms including pain, difficulty walking and sexual dysfunction. An eight-year Good Health campaign to get official recognition of the problem led to the establishment of a government inquiry under the leadership of former Conservative health minister Baroness Julia Cumberlege. Although the inquiry report was published in July 2020, some of its key recommendations have still not been implemented, leaving thousands of women suffering and not getting the help they need. Seven specialist NHS mesh removal clinics were meant to open in April this year in London, Cambridge, Manchester, Newcastle, Nottingham, Sheffield and Leicester. But the affected women claim a shortage of specialists has meant that only two are functioning — at University College London Hospital and Southmead Hospital in Bristol (which was not on the original list). They also say that it's extremely difficult to get a referral to one of these new centres and even if they do, waiting times can stretch into years. "To the doctors who originally treated us, these operations weren't anything major — but to us it was a catastrophically painful loss of work, family life and intimacy," says Mary. Mary's story is one familiar to almost 10,000 women who have joined an anti-mesh group called Sling the Mesh, and a number of other support organisations. Read full story Source: Mail Online, 1 November 2021 Blogs from Kath Sansom, Sling the Mesh Regulatory flaws: Women were catastrophically failed in the mesh, Primodos and Sodium Valproate tragedies Ineffective medical device recalls are a patient safety scandal
  17. News Article
    Gender bias is leaving many women with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder undiagnosed, leading psychologists are warning. The prevailing stereotype ADHD affects only "naughty boys" means at least tens of thousands in the UK, it is estimated, are unaware they have the condition and not receiving the help they need. "I used to tell doctors and therapists all the time, 'You've got to make this constant noise in my head stop. I can't think. I can't sleep. I can't get any peace,' but this was always dismissed as anxiety or women's problems," Hester says. Diagnosed with depression at 16, she spent much of her 20s unsuccessfully battling to be referred to a psychiatrist. And she constantly felt she was not reaching her true potential. Hester was finally diagnosed with ADHD in 2015, aged 34, and only, she says, because her husband had discovered he had the condition, a year earlier. His diagnosis took 12 months. "At no point did anyone say to Chris, 'This sounds like anxiety,' or 'Have some tablets,'" Hester says. "He was taken seriously." "Whereas with me, I was on the doctor's radar from the age of 16. "Bluntly, it took so long for me to be diagnosed because I'm a woman." Read full story Source: BBC News, 26 October 2021
  18. News Article
    MP Carolyn Harris is part of a movement determined to smash the remnants of the menopause taboo, pushing a private member’s bill to turn up the volume on a debate about the menopause that is growing louder by the day. As an increasing number of countries, businesses and individuals mark World Menopause Day today, Harris says she is ready to shame whoever stands in the way of progress. Harris will lead a small army of supporters to Parliament Square in London before her bill, which is due to be heard on the 29 October, to demand free prescriptions for hormone replacement therapy in England – already available in Scotland and Wales. The government is said to be “interested” in the bill, with Harris adding that she has cross-party support from dozens of MP. “In the last two years the narrative has completely changed,” says Harris, who adds that since the private members bill was announced she’s had calls from countries from Canada and the US, to Australia and Japan. “People are waking up to the fact that we have to find a better way of supporting women through the menopause,” she says. “Women are enhanced coming through this process, but only if they get the support they need.” The evidence suggests they all too often don’t. There are more than 13 million currently experiencing menopause or perimenopause in the UK. Menopause campaigners argue that medical sexism and a lack of training means many women are left to suffer the symptoms of menopause – which can include depression, anxiety, insomnia and brain fog as well as hot flushes. Harris’s own experience with the menopause was brutal. Twenty years after losing her eight-year-old son in a road traffic accident she blamed herself for not processing her grief when she was hit by a deep depression. “It took me six years, having conversations with women, for me to realise I was going through the menopause,” she says. Read full story Source: The Guardian, 18 October 2021
  19. News Article
    In a Letter to the Editor published in The Times yesterday, the All Party Parliamentary Group on First Do No Harm Co-Chair Baroness Julia Cumberlege argues in favour of the work of the Independent Medicines and Medical Devices Safety (IMMDS) Review and its report 'First Do No Harm'. "Inquiries are only as good as the change for the better that results from their work." Read full letter (paywalled) Source: The Times, 5 January 2021
  20. News Article
    Women are undergoing “painful and distressing” diagnostic tests as doctors use the COVID-19 pandemic as an excuse not to offer them their choice of pain relief, HSJ has been told. At least 70 women who have had hysteroscopies this year in English NHS hospitals said they were left in extreme pain following the procedures, with many suffering trauma for several days, according to a survey by the Campaign Against Painful Hysteroscopies group. Some women claimed doctors used COVID-19 as an “excuse” not to offer sedation or general anaesthetic. Others said they were offered an inpatient appointment with general anaesthetic, but were also told it would be a long wait and would likely be cancelled due to covid pressures. Women also said they were told an outpatient procedure would reduce the time spent in hospital and consequently reduce the risk of contracting covid. The only pain relief on offer was often just ibuprofen and some women said facilities like recovery rooms were unavailable. The vast majority of the women surveyed — more than 90% — said they were traumatised for a day or longer by the pain from the procedure, A RCOG spokeswoman said: “We are concerned to hear that women are going through painful and distressing hysteroscopy procedures and that they feel COVID-19 is being used as an excuse not to offer a choice of anaesthetic." “The covid-19 pandemic has put incredible strain on the health services, and the risk of transmission of the virus has meant they’ve had to adapt their procedures. Whilst all women should be offered a choice of anaesthesia and treatment settings for hysteroscopic procedures, an outpatient setting avoids hospital admission and reduces the risk of exposure to the virus." “The RCOG guidance on this is very clear — all pain relief options should be discussed with women, as well as the risks and benefits of each. Women should be given the choice of a local or general anaesthetic. If the procedure is still too painful, no matter what anaesthetic options are chosen, it must be stopped and a further discussion of pain relief options should then take place. It’s vital that women are listened to and their choice is fully supported.” Read full story Source: HSJ, 21 December 2020
  21. News Article
    Women in a newly opened psychiatric intensive care unit (PICU) had concerns for their sexual safety, a Care Quality Commission (CQC) report has revealed. Inspectors found women in the PICU at Cygnet Health Care’s Godden Green Hospital, in Kent, were afraid to shower because male staff did not always knock before entering bedrooms and staff entered bathrooms without permission. Patients were often looked after by male staff despite having asked for a female staff member and, in some cases, had an all-male care team. Most patients the inspectors spoke to had concerns about their sexual safety. The CQC carried out an unannounced inspection of the PICU in October, following concerns raised by members of the public and to check concerns identified in an earlier inspection of the hospital’s child and adolescent mental health services were not organisational. The PICU opened in November 2019. Since the summer, Kent and Medway NHS and Social Care Partnership Trust has commissioned some of the beds, but HSJ understands it stopped admissions for a time to review the care being provided. Inspectors found records referred to PICU patients as “difficult” and “troublemakers” and warned a ”culture of negativity towards patients had developed among some staff”. Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 4 December 2020
  22. News Article
    A network of specialist surgical mesh removal centres is to be set up around England, with a launch planned for April 2021. The move implements a recommendation of the review, chaired by the Conservative peer and former health minister Julia Cumberlege, into three treatments which caused avoidable harm. These included the use of transvaginal tape and pelvic mesh to treat pelvic organ prolapse and urinary incontinence. The review, which published its report in July, heard “harrowing” stories about women left with serious complications. The mesh is hard to remove and only a few surgeons in the UK are able to carry out the procedure. Read full story (paywalled) Source: BMJ, 25 November 2020
  23. News Article
    Mothers are being needlessly separated from their babies under strict hospital restrictions introduced to stop the spread of COVID-19, doctors and charities have warned. The measures preventing UK parents from staying with their babies when one or both require hospital treatment are causing trauma and increasing the risk of physical and mental health problems, it is claimed. Some parents of sick babies are also being barred from seeing their child in neonatal units, which is causing distress and preventing bonding. Campaigners have written to the health secretary, Matt Hancock, to raise their concerns. They want hospitals to review these policies urgently and have called for a working group to draw up national standards to meet families’ needs during pregnancy, birth and breastfeeding. Read full story Source: The Guardian, 16 November 2020
  24. News Article
    Lawyers have begun legal action on behalf of 200 UK women against the makers of a sterilisation device, after claims of illness and pain. The device, a small coil called Essure, was implanted to prevent pregnancies. Manufacturer Bayer has already set aside more than $1.6bn (£1.2bn) to settle claims from almost 40,000 women in the US. It has withdrawn the device from the market for commercial reasons but says it stands by its safety and efficacy. The metal coil was inserted into the fallopian tube to cause scarring, blocking the tube and preventing pregnancy. Introduced in 2002, it was promoted as an easy, non-surgical procedure - a new era in sterilisation. But many women who had the device fitted have now either had hysterectomies or are waiting for procedures to remove the device. Tracey Pitcher, who lives in Hampshire, felt she had completed her family and did not want any more children. Her doctor strongly encouraged her to have an Essure device fitted, she says. But after it had been, she began to feel very unwell. "I just started to have heavy periods, migraines, which I had only ever had when I was pregnant so they were hormonal," she says. "My back was so painful I'd wake up crying in the middle of the night with pains in my hips and my back." Tracey says she battled to persuade doctors to take her symptoms seriously. But the only information she received was from a Facebook group. "... there's nobody there, there's no support apart from people that we've found ourselves, no-one will listen, because it's just 'women's things'." Read full story Source: BBC News, 15 November 2020
  25. News Article
    A Tory peer has attacked the Department of Health and Social Care’s ‘woeful’ response to the patient safety review she authored and has revealed she intends to create a cross-party group to force action. Baroness Julia Cumberlege - who led the “First Do No Harm” report on device and medicine safety– has said she has “not had a whisper” from the department over the report’s key recommendations since it was published in July. She told HSJ’s Patient Safety Congress she is setting up a cross-party parliamentary group to “pressure” the department to adopt the report’s recommendations. The report arose from The Independent Medicines and Medical Devices Safety Review, which spoke to more than 700 people, mostly women, who suffered avoidable harm from surgical mesh implants, pregnancy tests and the anti-epileptic drug sodium valproate. The report discovered “a culture of dismissive and arrogant attitudes” including the unacceptable labelling of many symptoms as “attributable to ‘women’s problems’”. It concluded that the NHS has “either lost sight of the interests of all those it was set up to serve or does not know how best to do this.” Health and social care secretary Matt Hancock and minister Nadine Dorries have apologised to the women who were harmed but the department has so far not responded to the report’s other eight recommendations in detail. Baroness Cumberlege said the cross party group would “[try] to open up a firmly shut departmental door. A department that doesn’t seem to get it.” She said: “We have been disappointed [in the department’s response] because we hoped by now we would have some sort of inclination about what’s going on." “The response from the department on the other key recommendations has been woeful. The reason they give is ‘there is a terrible amount of work to do’”. Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 11 November 2020
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