Latest news – Page 2754

  • News

    Upheaval, mayhem, poor morale - and all for what? Merger mania is causing seismic shifts that may not fulfil expectations

    1999-01-21T00:00:00Z

    On 1 April the NHS structure throughout the UK will look radically different to how it did just 23 months earlier when Labour came to power. A decade ago, the service protested shrilly against the pace of change instigated by the Thatcher reforms; the internal market took three years to ...

  • News

    Same again but with a difference The only real option open to Labour is to fund the nurses' pay award

    1999-01-21T00:00:00Z

    Ministers are currently having that hardest of lessons about the NHS rammed down their throats - namely, that no matter how much money you allocate to it, sooner or later (usually sooner) it will raise a cacophonous clamour for even more.

  • News

    A come-back for public service

    1999-01-21T00:00:00Z

    'The desire to preserve and improve 'our' NHS is still strong enough to bind individuals through enormous changes'

  • News

    WEB WATCH

    1999-01-21T00:00:00Z

    Do you ever feel you were robbed of the opportunity to develop UK foreign policy towards Tashkent or to draft white papers on white fish quotas - and all because you got such bad careers advice at school?

  • News

    St Tony of Lost Causes tends the sick at heart

    1999-01-21T00:00:00Z

    Now that Charlie Whelan has hung up his boots as spin doctor to Chancellor Brown it is safe to say without fear of reprisal that there are distinct dangers attached to over-cleverness in his trade.

  • News

    Soviet-style back-stabbing and political goulash - welcome to PCGs

    1999-01-21T00:00:00Z

    In April, primary care groups - still talking shops without secretariats - will 'go live', setting pro and anti-fundholders together, in an attempt at enforcing unifying policies among GPs of diverse opinion. Similarly, nurses, health visitors, social workers and political appointees will be plunged into the melting pot, the inevitable ...

  • News

    Treating the drug-cost headache by tapping into regional expertise

    1999-01-21T00:00:00Z

    PCGs will be under considerable pressure to cut prescribing costs and obtain the best value for money from drugs.

  • News

    Our egalitarian government should halt this drain on the public purse

    1999-01-21T00:00:00Z

    I received a flyer from QMW Public Policy Seminars, London University, inviting me to hand over £300 of public money (£259 plus VAT) to attend a day seminar on inequalities in health.

  • News

    Wiping the floor with comments on pay

    1999-01-21T00:00:00Z

    I appreciate that doctors' pay is a significant issue, but it is grossly overstated by Nizam Mamode, deputy chair of the British Medical Association's junior doctors committee ('Quick march', 3 December).

  • News

    Complaints convenors can be impartial...

    1999-01-21T00:00:00Z

    Hilda Harvey's letter (3 December) shows a level of prejudice and bias that does little to instil confidence in her independence as a complaints convenor.

  • News

    Cancer trials: money is not only currency of success

    1999-01-21T00:00:00Z

    Alan Maynard's article ('Looking Askance', 19 November), on the cost-effectiveness of cancer services, was disappointing in its narrowness of approach.

  • News

    Going our not-so-separate ways on health and social services spending

    1999-01-21T00:00:00Z

    In 'Separate ways' (26 November), Paul Jervis and Robert Hazell write that 'the latest figures indicate that Northern Ireland and Scotland receive around 30 per cent per capita more than England, while Wales receives around 15 per cent more'.

  • News

    monitor

    1999-01-21T00:00:00Z

    Monitor wouldn't wish to suggest anyone was panicking about the millennium bug, but when hospitals start sinking their own wells to ensure continued water supplies 'just in case', there must be something going on. Northwick Park Hospital communications manager Brian Goodinson says the idea does hold other attractions, even if ...

  • News

    When the chips are down

    1999-01-21T00:00:00Z

    Some hospitals now seem confident of thwarting the millennium computer bug. Other are worried about basic utilities and concern over IT staffing levels is widespread. Peter Mitchell reports; 'Staffing over the meltdown period is the real problem'

  • News

    'Even the best performers have much to do, but some have an awful lot more to do than others'

    1999-01-21T00:00:00Z

    Taking the slow road: Scotland's year 2000 problem

  • News

    One for the boys

    1999-01-21T00:00:00Z

    'The clinic is staffed by specially trained GPs'

  • News

    Key points

    1999-01-21T00:00:00Z

    An increase in the number of complications following male circumcisions performed by non-professionals led to the establishment of a special clinic for religious circumcisions.

  • News

    Making their marker

    1999-01-21T00:00:00Z

    Paul Myers is a GP and senior lecturer at the department of general practice and primary care, St Bartholomew's and the Royal London School of Medicine.

  • News

    Key points

    1999-01-21T00:00:00Z

    The performance indicators currently in use are not reliable for assessing individual GPs or identifying poor performers.

  • News

    Reuters joins exodus from NHS market

    1999-01-21T00:00:00Z

    Reuters has sold its GP software operations to a French company, Cegedim SA.