To ask what YOU would do to help save the NHS?

[TamiTayorismyparentingguru]

I don’t care if you’re an HCP or not, I don’t care who you vote for, I don’t care what you think about Brexit - all opinions welcome.

Opinions on practical suggestions on how to save the NHS only though.

Our local hospital is getting worse and worse with regards to staff shortages and waiting lists getting longer and longer. I will say that our GP is really great and we’ve never really had a problem with getting appointments etc, but as soon as you are referred to the hospital things go massively downhill. (We did have a GP misdiagnose/miss DH’s cancer which was pretty shit - but I wouldn’t say that was a particular problem with the system - more just one of those unfortunate things that happens, that really shouldn’t happen, but that are just a matter of course.)

The hospital is a different story though - wait lists for some departments are insane (current wait time for an initial cataracts appointment is 42 weeks and then up to 18m for treatment, paediatric dermatology is a min of 30weeks, paediatric podiatry is approx 30weeks also. I have been on a wait list for max fax for 14mths so far. I also had an 8week wait for an appointment at the breast clinic after seeing the GP with a noticeable lump.)

DH has also had to fight for every single appointment since his cancer treatment last year - instead of the 4-weekly appointments he’s meant to have had, most of his appointments have been 7-8 weeks apart and have been cancelled at the last minute (sometimes just an hour before) at least 4 times in the last year.

It’s awful and yet I do trust that the doctors, nurses, receptionists etc etc are all doing everything they possibly can.

What’s the solution?

What Six above has just said plus look at the trusts that are highly rated and efficient and transfer their practices to the others.
It is not perfect by any means but we are very lucky to have it I am livin g in a place at the moment where you need health insurance and prescription medicines are advertised on TV our system is much better.

Best practice is already shared between Trusts.
Research into new ways of doing things are already done in the NHS and then those changes implemented.
People in the NHS are constantly working to improve and make the NHS more efficient.

However, none of that gets reported in the tabloid press and our govt (who incidentally finds this work) doesn't mention it in their frothy speeches.

Amd the people doing this.....managers.

@Judygarlandspills now trolling on an infertility thread and mocking infertile women because her opinion was challenged. Just wow!

I've worked in the NHS and in my experience it's the managers who are the ones going around asking why this document is being printed off when we have an electronic copy and why does it take two members of staff to do that job and why are we paying to send this item to another department by post when we could use the internal post, and so on. Our managers were doing a lot with very little, at one point we didn't even have an office until the manager took ownership of a large supply cupboard(!) and had workbenches and computers installed, we didn't even have chairs and had to sit on step-stools and upturned crates. She was told that she needed to order new chairs for us and said no, instead she went on a mooch around the hospital and came back with half a dozen office chairs she found sitting unused in storage.

It would be interesting to get someone High Up to come and answer all these suggestions. Eg, "No, we can't stop prescribing paracetamol because..." or "We can't cut admin staff by 50% because..."

Otherwise we all just look around and judge from our own experience.

Otoh you get people who seem to want the NHS to provide everything and anything. I don't object to hospital parking charges. Yes, they are steep, but if you are there to receive free treatment, then take it on the chin. So a blood test costs £4 in parking charges by the time you have waited. If you can run a car, then you can flippin' well afford £4 in the grand scheme of things.

Or people complaining about the food. If you want gourmet food prepared to order (not to mention meeting all the health and safety standards etc) then how much do you think that is going to cost? Just be grateful there is something provided.

As per @EwItsAHooman there is definitely a need for managers. Good ones who sort stuff out.

I think the big issue is management of funds. I do think that the NHS as a public sector organisation, because of its good employment benefits, especially sick pay, does suffer from people taking advantage. I absolutely believe that the majority of people working in the NHS are worth their weight in gold, but as is typical with public sector, people who take the piss, or are bad at their job just get left or moved, rather than sacked to make room for more of the gold people! I say this as someone who works in the public sector now myself, when I came from private sector my jaw dropped at the ones who clearly took the piss. In private sector they'd be managed out of the business. In public sector their managed and pandered to with kid gloves. Which starts to cause resentment and a "that's not my job/remit" culture. Which quickly can rot an organisation from the inside.

That and the fact that there needs to be massive investment into care in the community for the bed blocking situation to be alleviated.

." I don't object to hospital parking charges"

This is something else that needs to work both ways Some of the people having to pay these exorbitant parking charges are on Carers Allowance Maybe they should start billing the NHS for the money they save them. If family carers all went on strike tomorrow there would be a lot more to worry about than the things mentioned on this thread.

Someone mentioned why there isnt more care in the community DURRHH Perhaps its because carers are treated like shit.

One minute carers are scroungers The next minute their meagre Carers Allowance is expected to stretch to parking charges.

And another reason there isnt as much care done at home now is not just because the Carers Allowance isnt enough. Its because most of that care was done by women A lot of whom now work They got on their bikes and moved to look for work like they were told to.

I agree re parking charges but some people are on a really strict budget and it impacts on them more.

At our local hospital when I was visiting they gave a slice of bread and butter for breakfast. When patients asked for toast they were told toasters set off the fire alarms. Funny how hotels, prisons etc can have mechanical toasters that don’t set off alarms. I think it is a culture of saying no rather than yes.

I'd happily pay more NI . I think we all need to. It's the only way. I'd rather pay more NI and keep service for all to use than go down the private insurance route.

Rather than increasing NIC rates and the burden falling on workers again, how about charging NIC on all income, i.e. charge it on occupational pensions, buy to let profits, dividends, etc. It would raise billions and "the poor" wouldn't be hit because of the lower thresholds that would exempt people with only low state pensions, low amounts of investment income, etc.

Re: carers. Unpaid carers save the government billions in social care and the NHS would be absolutely fucked if we all held our hands up tomorrow and said "nuh-uh, we quit". Not to TAAT but if you value the work of carers then there is a petition thread here:

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/_chat/3395948-Please-sign-the-poll-for-Carers-in-the-UK-We-need-your-help

That's a bloody good point @Kazzyhoward

I'd like to opt out of the NHS. And TFL, too, please, while we're at it. Giant, bloated, intractable bureaucracy.

1.Charge for missed appointments
2.Referred back to GP if wasting A&E time/not urgent (tired of seeing people with sprained ankle or a splinter on A&E programmes)
3.More Nurses, better paid
4.Weekends staffed better (our Hospital has practically no staff then when I've visited which worried me)
5.Operations thru the night not just if it's emergency (that business guru who did a save the NHS thing ages ago said the same,he also said after 1pm on Fri half the v senior consultants 'aren't available' (?? )

why this obsession with charging for missed appointments?

This is a long time ago but anyway:

When I worked in the NHS 25% of people never attended their outpatient appointments. No notice or anything. I always sent a reminder in good time with contact details.

Departments held onto patient notes and didn't hand them back to records as they should have, records couldn't care less, Professor wouldn't see the patient without the notes so had to cancel and rebook. Patient needed transport so the costs added up.

I could go on and on with examples.

I'd add 3p to the basic rate of income tax solely for the NHS. I have five relatives who work in the NHS and another who works in a factory whose sole client is the NHS. It needs properly funding and a root and branch reform of how it is managed. There should also have a qualifying period for people to receive treatment. I have met people from other countries who have been diagnosed in their home country and then they come to the UK for treatment under EU freedom of movement. I live in a rural area and have met five people who have done this, so the situation must be worse in the city's. I would suggest tha they should be a two year qualifying period.

I'd add 3p to the basic rate of income tax solely for the NHS

And in another few years, it'd be in crisis again and another 3p would be needed. Don't forget Labour trebled spending on the NHS under Blair/Brown, and clearly it still isn't enough. Without reform it will bankrupt the country.

Charge for anti natal and maternity services. Having children is a choice not an illness.

Brilliant idea, we'll get rid of loads of poor people as well doing that as they'll start dying in childbirth because they can't afford maternity care.

Charging people is not the answer, it just creats a classist society.

@Onlyhappywhenitrains1 if you carry on reading the thread you'll see that I said I don't actually think that, I was playing devils advocate.

The only solution is to have a very long hard discussion about what the nhs should pay for...there’s always new ways to keep people alive from things they would in the past have died of immediately (eg transplants, chemo drugs, help for very premature babies)...I’m not suggesting that these are not worthwhile but this is a discussion that needs to be had. The NHS was founded at a time that people died pretty quickly after retirement- so not only no transplants etc but also none of costs of old age diseases.

We could throw 100% of gdp at the nhs and still spend it all...this discussion needs to be had. But it’s political suicide!

Agree @PetraDelphiki

Charge for anti natal and maternity services. Having children is a choice not an illness.

The ignorance of this tweet is astounding, ant natal appointments when brought in drastically reduced death from pregnancy related conditions & is on reSon that employers are by law compounded to allow staff to visit any Nate appointments

Charge for appointments that are refunded if you show up!

@ivykaty44 read the thread. You will see that was posted as devils advocate to those saying ban ivf because having children is a choice. It was said tongue in cheek.

Cheesy I find it in very bad taste, however anyone wants to justify what’s written. Woman died through lack of anti Nate’s care which is so simple to give and spits early the symptoms that cause death and made pregnancy dangerous

@ivykaty44 fair comment. I can see why you think that.