External contributors – Page 249

  • Comment

    Sandy Watson on NHS performance management

    2008-12-12T01:00:00Z

    NHS boards have very clear roles. They must ensure governance arrangements are sound, probity and propriety are to the fore, a strategic steer is given to the executive team and staff, the executives are held to account and supported, and there are clear and effective performance management mechanisms.

  • Comment

    Your Humble Servant on NHS co-payments

    2008-12-11T09:00:00Z

    To: Don Wise, chief executiveFrom: Paul Servant, assistant chief executiveRe: Co-payment cunning

  • Comment

    Sophia Christie on becoming a world class commissioner

    2008-12-11T09:00:00Z

    Every primary care trust is participating in the first stage of the world class commissioning assurance process. World class commissioning is not the little brother of foundation trust development, or even Big Brother, although it can seem like that.

  • Comment

    Media Watch: public health budgets

    2008-12-11T01:00:00Z

    Those seeking to defend public health budgets amid financial turmoil were unlikely to take heart from the press this week.

  • Comment

    Michael White on the NHS in recession

    2008-12-11T01:00:00Z

    A rough old trade is politics, as most MPs can confirm. All the same, I felt a bit sorry for Andrew Lansley the other week when he was beaten up for saying 'on many counts recession can be good for us'.

  • Comment

    Improving patient safety: advice for NHS boards

    2008-12-10T09:00:00Z

    Institute for Healthcare Improvement president and chief executive Donald Berwick talks to Stockport foundation trust chair Robina Shah about the role of NHS boards in improving patient safety and quality of care

  • Comment

    A future for general practice

    2008-12-09T09:00:00Z

    Issues such as GP extended hours (where clumsy government handling of the issue and stubborn BMA behaviour pushed the issue to the wire) and the procurement of GP-led health centres (GPLHCs) encapsulate the tensions from which GP services will be shaped in the next 10 years.

  • Comment

    Ken Jarrold on Barack Obama the manager

    2008-12-08T01:00:00Z

    For students of leadership and management, these are interesting times. Two very different people, in very different worlds, have been teaching those open to learning.

  • Comment

    David Lee on the prison mental health dilemma

    2008-12-08T01:00:00Z

    Not only do mental health trusts work with some of the most vulnerable members of our communities, it sometimes falls to us to support unfashionable causes too.

  • Comment

    Neil Goodwin on coping with recession in the NHS

    2008-12-08T01:00:00Z

    Recession. It's what everyone is talking about and it will affect you at some point. The boom years are now drawing to a close and public sector budgets are about to see their biggest squeeze in more than a decade.

  • Comment

    David Woodhead on an NHS revolution

    2008-12-08T01:00:00Z

    'All that is solid', wrote Marx in 1848, 'melts into air'. He was reflecting on what happens when the certainties that give our life structure and meaning are inverted.

  • Comment

    Noel Plumridge on commissioning for quality and innovation

    2008-12-04T01:00:00Z

    We now know the 'road test' phase of tariff setting for the English NHS begins on 8 December, when the draft tariff for 2009-10 will at last be published.

  • Comment

    Media Watch: Andrew Lansley's recession comments

    2008-12-04T01:00:00Z

    Shadow health secretary Andrew Lansley does not make headlines that often, but this week he had no shortage of coverage after he wrote on an official Conservative party website that recession 'can be good for us' because people tend to smoke and booze less, eat less rich food and spend ...

  • Comment

    Michael White on the public sector workforce

    2008-12-04T01:00:00Z

    'Welcome to Soviet Britain,' the Daily Mail's headline roared this week. What on earth is the scourge of the NHS complaining about this time? I murmured, flinching over my first cuppa of the day.

  • Comment

    Simon Jones on improving the NHS

    2008-12-03T09:00:00Z

    This will be my last piece for hsj.co.uk. After 20 years serving on health authorities and trust boards, I am leaving for pastures new.

  • Comment

    Lisa Rodrigues on achieving NHS equality

    2008-12-01T09:00:00Z

    This year, 5 November was a very special day. The world woke up to find that the people of the United States had voted for the best presidential candidate, who also just happened to be black.

  • Comment

    David Amos on developing the NHS workforce

    2008-12-01T01:00:00Z

    Into media coverage dominated by world events has crept something intriguing about bees. Scientists at Queensland University have used nectar-drenched markers in a tunnel to show that the insects can count up to four.

  • Comment

    Lesley Wright on lean thinking and respecting NHS staff

    2008-12-01T01:00:00Z

    Managers and clinical staff interested in lean healthcare often stall at the same point: 'We want to adopt lean thinking but want to call it something else. 'Lean' is hard to sell to our staff.'

  • Comment

    Angela Greatley on help for released prisoners

    2008-11-28T01:00:00Z

    Every year, more than 80,000 people end prison sentences in the UK. Most have a complex mix of mental health problems alongside drug or alcohol addictions and a myriad of other difficulties to face.

  • Comment

    Your Humble Servant: clinician questions

    2008-11-27T09:00:00Z

    To: Don Wise, chief executiveFrom: Paul Servant, assistant chief executiveRe: How hard can it be?