Wednesday 10 October 2012

EMAS staff have highest sick rate in the NHS

EMAS staff have highest sick rate in the NHS: The county’s ambulance service has claimed its station closures plan will help sickness rates after it emerged it has the highest proportion of staff off ill in the entire NHS. Evening Telegraph

Getting value for money from commissioning

Getting value for money from commissioning: More data is available to commissioners than ever before, says Wallace Rosenberg, and savvy commissioners who can keep an audit trail of imperfect data and who can engage the right stakeholders will benefit as, ultimately, will their patients. The Health Foundation

VIDEO: Hunt: We know how much health matters

VIDEO: Hunt: We know how much health matters: Demand for health services had increased by 4% and real-terms spending on the NHS in England was going up "by a small amount", said the new health secretary. BBC News

Infographic: how flu affects GPs across the UK

Infographic: how flu affects GPs across the UK: See the impact of flu on GP practices across the UK this winter and follow the links to see the local picture in England, Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland. This infograph will be updated weekly throughout winter. GP Online

Hunt emphasises IT in first major speech

Hunt emphasises IT in first major speech: The technology revolution has "barely touched" patient experience in the NHS, health secretary Jeremy Hunt told the Conservative Party conference in Birmingham yesterday. E-Health Insider

Mental health and the market

Mental health and the market: Mental health services represent a significant area of expenditure in the NHS. In 2010/11, the total investment in adult and older people’s mental health services in England was £7.19 billion. NHS Confederation

Shared learning examples for health visitors

Shared learning examples for health visitors: These examples capture changes being made to the health visiting
workforce as a result of the Health Visitor Implementation Plan 2011 -
2015. The first covers the development of the assistant practitioner
role in universal child services and highlights the benefits of
workforce skill-mix. The second describes a strategy to offer student
health visitors employment on the successful completion of their
Specialist Community Public Health Nursing qualification.

Dirty dentists put patients at risk



Dirty dentists put patients at risk:
A Freedom of Information request by the Telegraph has found one in nine dentists inspected by the Care Quality Commission (CQC) breached guidelines on how to clean tools and limit the spread of diseases.Of the 1,667 dentists inspected by the CQC in 2011, 189 were discovered not to follow Department of Health rules on how to ensure the cleanliness of equipment and surgeries.Katherine Murphy, chief execu... Healthcare Today

NHS reforms should give patients more power and control

NHS reforms should give patients more power and control:
Greater involvement is a higher priority for patients than being able to choose between treatment providers
"Putting patients first" has been a goal of successive governments, but actions have so far failed to match up to the rhetoric.

Jeremy Hunt promises to change NHS culture with new focus on older people

Jeremy Hunt promises to change NHS culture with new focus on older people:
Hunt says he will improve dementia care and presents himself as NHS-friendly Tory at Conservative party conference
Jeremy Hunt has promised to "transform the culture" of the NHS, making it "the best in the world at looking after older people" in his first speech as health secretary to the Tory party conference.

Doctors reported to police over use of controversial death pathway

Doctors reported to police over use of controversial death pathway: A son has reported doctors to police after discovering they had put his elderly mother on the controversial death pathway without telling him, it has emerged. The Daily Telegraph

New guide to help treat patients with dementia in hospital

New guide to help treat patients with dementia in hospital: The Royal College of Nursing has launched a guide to help nursing staff care for people with dementia in hospital.

Update on acute respiratory illness associated with a new coronavirus

Update on acute respiratory illness associated with a new coronavirus: In two reports published in Eurosurveillance on 4 October 2012, the Health Protection Agency (HPA) confirms that since the first case of severe respiratory illness associated with a new type of coronavirus was reported on 22 September 2012, there have been no new, cases reported in the UK. The patient being treated in the UK with confirmed coronavirus infection continues to receive intensive care treatment in a London hospital. Health Protection Agency