All Comment articles – Page 288
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Comment
Use it or lose it: freedom from Whitehall is a two-way street
At last week's Primary Care Trust Network conference, the discussion with NHS chief executive David Nicholson revealed how hard it is for the centre to let go - especially when local health services won't release their grip on the Department of Health's hand.
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Media Watch: drug maker under scrutiny
Being accused of 'cheating the NHS' is enough to give anyone heartburn. So bosses at Reckitt Benckiser, makers of indigestion treatment Gaviscon, may well have sought comfort with a taste of their own medicine this week.
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Doubts over super-regulator
You do not mention an important question for the new super-regulator, writes Don Redding. Will it exist to serve patients and service users, and if so, how will it engage with them?
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PCT rebrand will help end identity crisis
Public sector rebranding exercises are often seen as a costly and pointless distraction. But the proposal to rebrand primary care trusts - so Oldham PCT would become NHS Oldham, for example - makes a great deal of sense and does not need to cost money.
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TV chaplains skew reality
A recent episode of Holby City showed a chaplain - described as a 'lay reader' from the so-called Holby Christian Fellowship - visiting a patient.
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Your Humble Servant: carry on nurses
To: Don Wise, chief executiveFrom: Paul Servant, assistant chief executiveRe: Ooh you are awful, but I like you
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Michael White on Darling's budget
By the time you read this, Alistair Darling's first Budget will have reinforced Gordon Brown's latest promise to make our great public services more competitive and accountable to their customers. They are all Blairites now.
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AIDS: getting the word out to diverse communities
Educating immigrant groups about the AIDS epidemic in the UK must be treated as a key public health priority, as Hazel Barrett explains
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All Our Yesterdays
March 19, 1948, Public Assistance Journal and Health & Hospital ReviewJobs advertised this week: A resident nurse (female), who should be aged about 45 to 50, was required in an almshouse for men at Trinity Hospital, Greenwich. Applicants should have experience in home nursing and be used to treating elderly ...
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13 minutes to answer the phone? Life in the DH press office.
The Department of Health press office was mysteriously not answering the phones the day the BMA revealed that 92 per cent of GPs had voted in favour of the directed enhanced service on extended hours. It took HSJ journalists a bind boggling 13 minutes to get through. Perhaps they were ...
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Andrew Jones on extending primary care
As I opened the envelope from the British Medical Association, I found myself reflecting on a tumultuous few months. The envelope in question contained a justification of the GPs' committee's negotiating stance on extended hours and a form for voting on enhanced payments options.
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Surgeons are safe
I am extremely disappointed that HSJ chose to print the accusation regarding patient safety and the certification of doctors for the specialist register, writes Paul Streets
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NHS pyramid scheme remains unchanged
This week's report by HSJ shows that progress on driving up the lamentable levels of black and minority ethnic representation in NHS management ranks has stalled.
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West Kent patient safety
Contrary to the comments made by shadow health secretary Andrew Lansley, West Kent primary care trust came into being in October 2006, some six months after the start of the outbreak of C difficile at hospitals run by Maidstone and Tunbridge Wells trust, writes Bob Deans
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Juggling GP hours
In response to the article by NHS Employers' Alastair Henderson, 'GPs must see sense on hours', My colleagues and I do not have a problem particularly with working extended hours, writes Dr ARJ Boggis
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Emma Dent on having a drink
As I believe I have written here before, I have thought for some time that I would make a lousy alcoholic because I get terrible hangovers. Just thinking about my top five worst-ever mornings-after of all time makes me feel queasy.
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Stroke data
Michael White was kind to call our report NHS reform: national mantra, not local reality 'coherent' and 'intelligent'. I suspect we will have to agree to disagree about the benefits of reform, writes Helen Rainbow
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Noel Plumridge on topping up NHS care
It is a long time since NHS care was unequivocally free. Over half a century ago, in the final days of a post-war Labour government that was proud to nationalise not just healthcare but the 'commanding heights' of the British economy - coal, steel, the railways - a certain outspoken ...
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Michael White on health budgets
Opposition spokesmen as energetic as Andrew Lansley tend to respond to breaking news rather than to make it. It's the curse of opposition. When they're in the headlines it's usually bad news. The Tory health spokesman has been making headlines.
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Occupational health doctors get people back to work
The British Medical Association is right to say that GPs alone cannot reduce employee absence due to ill health (news, page 8, 21 February). Occupational health doctors are specialists trained to work with employees and employers, to rehabilitate people back into work, writes Gordon Parker