All Comment articles – Page 316
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Comment
Power to close NHS organisations gives super-regulator super-teeth
A long delay can create its own sense of drama - such is the case with the regulatory review which has been promised for the best part of a year and gone through various drafts (including a complete overhaul by McKinsey). In the event, the result published this week makes ...
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Janet Askham on the need to improve patient feedback
'If we continue to ask patients to give up their time to provide valuable feedback on their doctor's performance, surely we owe it to them at least to ask the right questions?'
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Comment
Six of the best on health inequalities
Despite its presence on the so-called Selbie Six list of NHS priorities for 2006-07, tackling health inequalities is proving a significant challenge for many primary care trusts.
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Comment
Service link economics
Letter from Angie Jezard, senior consultant, AJ Financial and Strategic Healthcare
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Comment
Data protection
'The DoH said... that data processing agreements were being put in place to comply with the Data Protection Act'. (Click herefor story.) Agreements with whom?
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Comment
Public health
Professor David Hunter's piece was an excellent, balanced article with a clear conclusion. I couldn't agree more on the need for a moratorium on organisational reform and its negative impact on public health, particularly public mental health.
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Listening to complaints
David Lee's article on listening to complaints was engaging. What would have been really useful is a sense of what has actually changed in the day-to-day operation of services and the impact on patient care, efficiency and staff relations.
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Comment
Funding formula
I am delighted that you reported calls to scrap the NHS funding formula on the evidence given to the health select committee by Professors Asthana, Stone and McCormick.
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Comment
Back to the wards
A selection of reader responses about our story on senior nurses going 'back to the wards' to save trusts money
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Comment
Andrew Jones on conspiracy or cock-up
'It could be kindly argued that, by general lack of enthusiasm, a third of the country is yet to churn out any meaningful health activity data, yet alone customise or dynamise it to specific local goals. Perhaps more telling is that two-thirds have yet to even put together a simple ...
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Dianne Leyland on the lack of clarity over local involvement networks
Voluntary and community groups must be actively involved if LINks are to work. Yet the sectors' goodwill, undermined by the botched creation of patient forums, is eroding further.
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Comment
The new economics
Treating individual services as profit-and-loss units promises to transform financial management and clinical engagement. With plans imminent for foundation trusts, Monitor chair Bill Moyes puts the case for a fresh approach
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Comment
Lots of turnaround, but no new direction
Is turnaround working? The latest figures from the Department of Health suggest there is little evidence yet that it is. Read the news story here. While the number of affected trusts has risen from an original 52 to a current 143, there are few clear signs that turnaround is bringing ...
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Comment
And so to bed The problem with mental health inpatients
Mental healthcare faces a problem of bed shortages for inpatient care, but while a large part of the solution might be stronger community support rather than increasing the number of available beds, there is still a need in some places to boost their number. Mat Kinton and Suki Desai explain
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Comment
Richard Barker on why the IT programme is never going to come right
'NPfIT will never get back on track; it was never on track in the first place. It breaks every rule of project management - from scoping to delivery - and is patently failing to take into account the actual requirements of clinicians across the NHS.'
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Comment
Emma Dent on publishing pictures of NHS demonstrations
A regular point of discussion at HSJTowers is whether we should publish pictures of demonstrations against NHS cuts and closures.
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Comment
David Peat on snipers and Special Ones
I believe that in the fullness of time we will look back at these months of uncertainty and see it as a short diversion from the grand task in hand.
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Comment
David Woodhead on love and understanding
'If love is all around us, why is it seldom discussed? What is the exact role of love in promoting health? And if love were a desired outcome, how would we recognise it?'
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Comment
Patient involvement
A current exemplar of the way the government misjudges citizen engagement is the proposal to introduce LINks and abolish Patient and Public Involvement Forums.
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Comment
Predicting unplanned admissions
Your article 'Long Term Conditions: Predicting the Future' (2 November 2006) showed the value of measuring the risk of patients experiencing unplanned admissions to hospital, and I thought it would be helpful to highlight other work that is underway