All Policy articles – Page 212
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News
NHS managers support top-up payments, HSJ poll reveals
NHS managers support the decision to allow top-up payments but believe it will make the NHS less equal and doubt it will work as a long-term solution.
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Comment
Charles Kaye and Michael Howlett on mental health in the slow lane
A number of high-profile news items about mental health have hit the headlines recently.
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News
NHS top-up review results announced
Primary care trusts will be expected to collaborate on commissioning decisions as a result of national clinical director for cancer Mike Richards' reforms to rules on topping up NHS care.
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News
NHS top-ups policy to be unveiled today
Health secretary Alan Johnson is set to unveil the government's new policy on NHS top-ups and co-payments later today.The expected announcement to MPs follows a wide-ranging review of the issue conducted by national clinical director for cancer Mike Richards.
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Comment
Achieving 18 weeks: engaging with NHS managers and clinicians
As the NHS hits the government's 18-week referral to treatment target early, national implementation director Philippa Robinson, a trained nurse, explains the important role clinical leadership has played in the achievement
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News
NHS Direct shelves foundation trust plans
NHS Direct has put its plans to become a foundation trust on ice. The decision follows government reluctance to free the national service from central control.The Department of Health feels it needs to be able to call on NHS Direct as an emergency hotline in the event of a terrorist ...
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News
Conservatives promise to speed up drug access
The Conservative Party has announced plans for changes to drug access and the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence.
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Comment
Hilary Thomas on NHS top-ups
I approach the subject of NHS top-ups with some trepidation. The issue is complex and there are no easy answers. Considering it from the cancer perspective, I will attempt to throw light into some dark corners of the debate.
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News
Latest NHS waiting times figures released
The Department of Health has released inpatient and outpatient waiting times figures for England for September.
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CommentAngela Greatley on the Mental Health Act
From 3 November, most parts of the long-awaited and often feared 2007 Mental Health Act will be implemented. For the NHS, the new act presents major challenges by extending the scope of compulsory powers and by creating some new safeguards for those subject to them.
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Comment
Michael White on pharmaceutical price regulation
I am indebted to Fred Curzon, 7th Earl Howe and veteran Tory health spokesman in the Lords, for a little gem of a debate in the upper house the other evening. It was doubtless neglected because of the Yachtgate affair in Corfu and relative trivia like the global financial collapse.
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News
Low NHS waiting times masking wide variation in performance
The NHS has achieved historically low hospital waiting times but faces a battle to ensure the 18 week target is hit in every area by December.
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News
Yorkshire SHA takes lead on quality pledge
NHS Yorkshire and the Humber is to set up a 'quality foundation', which it claims will go one step further than the regional quality observatories recommended by Lord Darzi.
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Comment
Media Watch: healthcare reviews
Unlike certain colleagues, health secretary Alan Johnson has never been invited onto a billionaire's gin palace. 'Trawlers occasionally, but never yachts,' he told The Daily Telegraph.
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News
Health inequalities: wealthiest overfunded as the poor lose out
NHS services in the poorest and most needy parts of the country are being systematically underfunded to the benefit of the healthiest and wealthiest.Analysis by HSJ of the budgets allocated to GPs to pay for drugs and hospital care for their patients show that the wealthiest tenth of the population ...
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Comment
Your Humble Servant on foundation trusts
To: Don Wise, chief executiveFrom: Paul Servant, assistant chief executiveRe: Money, Money, Monitor
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News
Johnson keeps the faith on inequalities
Health secretary Alan Johnson says the life expectancy gap is closing and he is promising the end of GP shortages. There is more to do but this is no time for a 'counsel of despair', he tells Rebecca Evans
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Leader
Hold your nerve - equality is not an expensive indulgence
This week's HSJ special edition on health inequalities looks at the causes, complexities, arguments and options that underpin this most intractable of policy issues.
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News
National NHS pay deal criticised
Nationally negotiated pay means commissioners' hands are tied from using bigger salaries to attract more good doctors, the Commons health select committee was told last week.
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News
Health inequalities could be forgotten as cash gets tight
Tighter NHS finances could mean the quest to reduce health inequalities will either get nasty - or be forgotten altogether.