To ask why the NHS is cancelling operations?!

[CFEC]

I'm due to have a (much needed and waited for) op in a few weeks time, I've just rung my consultant's secretary as I haven't had a pre-op appointment letter through yet and queried it, as I wanted to make sure the operation is definitely going ahead as if nothing else, I'll be off work for 2 weeks and my boss would ideally like confirmation.

She said 'Oh, well they're cancelling A LOT of inpatient appointments, but as you'll be a day patient no, I think yours will go ahead.'

I swear I will lose my sh&^ and cry if it gets cancelled again, this will be the third time!!!

Why is the NHS cancelling operations left, right and centre?! Surely it can't be due to Covid still? If it is, what is going to happen to us all, so many people are going to die surely as a result of not getting treatment? A lot more than with Covid! Most people are double vaccinated now, this virus isn't going away, why are operations for in patients being cancelled?

Staff are human.
Staff catch covid
Staff go off sick

I'm sorry you're worried about your operation.

Our local DGH is back to March levels of Covid inpatient numbers including ICU patients, so yes cancellations can be very much due to Covid.

We are not out of the woods yet.

It will take years to clear all the cancelled operations and appointments and yes people will be suffering, and possibly dying.

The long term underfunding of the NHS is coming back to bite, and bite hard. I have a nasty feeling it will get worse before it gets better.

Its not really as the effects of lockdown are multifaceted and numerous- impossible to quantify for sure, but naive to dismiss the reality

Yep, agree.
It's obviously impossible to say, but I read an article about missed cancers/late presentations. Estimates are that a lot of people will be later diagnoses because of lockdowns/fear of attending.

The PFI schemes weren’t great but at least we the public got something out of it.

Whereas under the Tories there has been a huge transfer of public money into private hands with very little to show - PPE, T&T are two recents but I think this has happened to a lot of wider services.

Remember the care home scandal? Where the private companies sold the buildings, rented them back then after a few years basically went bankrupt and the councils picked up the pieces?
(I’ll google and send a link).

Carillon was another mass transfer of wealth I think.

Ffs operations weren't cancelled because of lockdown! How can people read this thread and still think that? It makes no sense

www.psiru.org/node/16068.html

Care home scandal. Looking at the timeline I assume the privatisation started under Labour, but it is an example of what privatisation does to what in my mind should be public services.

Oh ffs. FFS.

Care homes started to be private’s in the 1980s. Guess who was in power?

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.carehome.co.uk/advice/amp/a-history-of-care-homes

Apols for the multiple posts, I should have looked further in the first place.

Anyway, my overall point is - long term privatisation seems to cause more problems in the long term, as the remit isn’t providing a good service it becomes providing a cheap service while extracting profit at all cost.

For while it might mean more efficiency, I’m sure the train network (British rail was underfunded and run down first) improved for a bit but look at our rail services now?

Expensive, broken (southern rail?) and huge handouts or part re-nationalisation from the govt when things get a little tricky.

@Dragon50 Would you be happy with a single state owned supermarket? As in you had to go to the National Shopping Service to buy your groceries, at the time and location which the permitted you to?

Or would you be happy with a nationalised housing service?

State controlled holiday provision?

I wouldn't want any of the above, so I don't really see why people are so passionate about health care being this way.

Germany for example has much better health care and uses a lot of outsourcing and private hospitals. People have freedom to choose form the basic mandatory level of health care of pay higher insurance premiums for a better service.

In the UK, you get what you're given irrespective of what you've contributed and if you have the audacity to receive private healthcare as part of your employment package. You'll be taxed on this as a benefit - for not using the NHS services you've already paid for through your tax contributions.

GP friend in our health board says they've been told to keep handing out pills, refer to physio, don't push for scanning unless it's dire. Do not chase up referrals they won't be acknowledged. We now have five years waiting lists for some procedures, they were two years before covid.

He's packing in his job and taking early retirement

In the UK, you get what you're given irrespective of what you've contributed and if you have the audacity to receive private healthcare as part of your employment package. You'll be taxed on this as a benefit - for not using the NHS services you've already paid for through your tax contributions

Even if you have private insurance, emergency care is provided through the NHS, unless you are lucky enough to be somewhere like London. Most private hospitals don't have an A+E, for example.
Private hospitals are good for diagnostics and cosmetic and minor surgery. Pretty much everything else (well, where I am in the arse end of nowhere- can't speak for everywhere) is done in the NHS hospital.

@CBUK22

The NHS has been a disgrace throughout COVID, they've cancelled millions of appointments and treatments.

It's not down to the government, its incompetent NHS trusts.

GP's have been shockingly bad too, ours have sent out a monthly text message telling us not to go near them.

That’s complete and utter nonsense. Have you not read and taken in what all the pp working in the NHS are telling you?

@Megameg56

Who is in power for the last 10 years.....there is your answer!

Funny it wasn't the Tory government who started cutting beds when my mum was a ward sister. It was Labour. If a ward was not 95% occupied they said it wasn't running efficiently and cut beds.

@TartanJumper

In the UK, you get what you're given irrespective of what you've contributed and if you have the audacity to receive private healthcare as part of your employment package. You'll be taxed on this as a benefit - for not using the NHS services you've already paid for through your tax contributions

Even if you have private insurance, emergency care is provided through the NHS, unless you are lucky enough to be somewhere like London. Most private hospitals don't have an A+E, for example.
Private hospitals are good for diagnostics and cosmetic and minor surgery. Pretty much everything else (well, where I am in the arse end of nowhere- can't speak for everywhere) is done in the NHS hospital.

Yes, if you're in an emergency you'll be well served by the NHS. In pretty much any other situation you'll be better cared for private.

For things like cancer care you get the same treatment, but you'll see a consultant and start treatment in hours/days rather than weeks/months with the NHS.

The NHS is an overly bureaucratic, inefficient, failing, sacred sacred cow that needs a serious re-think.

Why should it be taxed? You're already paying for the NHS and then you're paying another firm not to use the serive you pay for.

@Dragon50 Would you be happy with a single state owned supermarket? As in you had to go to the National Shopping Service to buy your groceries, at the time and location which the permitted you to?

Judging by the empty shelves in my supermarket this evening, it could be an option!

I’m kidding btw, however considering the number of Tory MPs cheering food banks maybe this will be in a future manifesto. Nationalised and provided by Serco.

Or would you be happy with a nationalised housing service?

What like council houses before they were largely sold off..?

State controlled holiday provision?
Not an essential.

Germany for example has much better health care and uses a lot of outsourcing and private hospitals. People have freedom to choose form the basic mandatory level of health care of pay higher insurance premiums for a better service.

We have this option now don’t we? I h e private healthcare, I’ve also paid for private treatment outside of the insurance. Many cannot afford to.

I would be fine with such a model if the general public and govt attitude wasn’t ‘I’m alright jack’. Germany tends to lean towards long term thinking in education, transport, housing services. The U.K. rarely does.

The NHS is highly privatised anyway which is part of the reason for the increased expense, yet we are not getting better services for that.

It should be taxed because if you need urgent A+E treatment, you'll be taken to A+E and may not even know about it.

If you have treatment in a private hospital and you become unwell and need a higher level of care, you'll be shipped off to the local NHS hospital.

Unless you have some way of making sure you'll never use the NHS again for anything ever, or some way of making your private insurance pay the NHS for received care, you should pay into it regardless.

@Awalkintime It's bizarre how so many in the UK are indoctrinated to think

left leaning = good

right leaning = bad

Especially given it's capitalism that's revolutionised the world we live in today and made us healthier and wealthier than any time in history.

Labour fucked up the NHS too. Pretty sure they started the PFI scheme, for one. But too young really to remember, hopefully someone older (and preferably who has worked in the NHS under both) can come along with some input.

That would be me then. Labour put huge investment into the NHS. Waiting times decreased, A&E four hour targets were at 98% in the Trust I worked in and even winter pressures were at a reasonable level.

The last 11 years have seen a completely senseless and destructive reform that cost £13 million, beds cut, waiting times rocket, staff leaving in droves and that was before Covid.

PFI was actually a Tory idea eagerly embraced by Labour. In principle it’s a great idea but, because the NHS is useless at negotiating and writing contracts, providers and management consultants stitched it up like a kipper. It’s cost a lot of our money.

Germany for example has much better health care and uses a lot of outsourcing and private hospitals. People have freedom to choose form the basic mandatory level of health care of pay higher insurance premiums for a better service

Germany also pays a third more per capita than the UK.

It isn't as simple as "go private" anyway.
As pp say private hospitals also have waiting lists, they also have staffing issues and the same problems recently with self isolation, social distancing, lack of beds, equipment and supplies.

And yes covid is still causing trouble despite numbers decreasing. Little things that patients don't even realise or notice like social distancing in waiting rooms meaning capacity for clinics is reduced.

Often the staff are the same, particularly the higher up you go as in surgeons/consultant etc there are only so many hours a day a surgeon can work in whether private or NHS particularly I specialist fields.

CBUK22
I'm not either so it makes no odds to me. I've seen shit from both Labour and Tories from my family working in the system so I can comment on both equally as I think both are a crock of shit.

I needed 2 surgeries as emergencies rather than 1 elective because the wait due to covie was so long. These 2 emergencies will have bumped 2 other people off of their elective surgery.

Most people I know of my age (26) would be happy to pay extra tax to fund a better NHS. But no political parties are actually promising that...

I completely sympathise OP. I've recently had a planned operation having been on the waiting list for 10 months and the emotional impact has been huge. My whole life was pretty much on hold, whilst not a life or death op, it was a major operation and has left me with life changing health conditions and therefore it's been a tough year waiting. My surgery got pushed back and then when I finally got a date, I sat I the hospital all day for it to be cancelled because they couldn't get a bed.

The staff are amazing and I know everyone is working so hard and I feel very grateful for everyone who supported me in what was a horrible time - HDU and no visitors included. But the mental health impact on all these people waiting is huge and I dread to think thr knock on effect of this.

I really hope you get your operation soon, sending best wishes.

Labour brought in NHS Choose & book giving you the choice of having routine operations in private hospitals under the NHS. It works well filling empty private beds with NHS patients & freeing NHS hospital beds for urgent patients. I've had five ops this way, found gynacological ones & one orthopaedic one. Patients are seen at convenient times, often in the evening or at weekends, they get a choice of times & dates for operations, everything is included, after care & physiotherapy. My experiences of this are good, everything happens when it should, you turn up around an hour before you are due in theatre, are booked in, see the anaesthetist & are off to theatre, you get a single ensuite room, a partner or family member can stay as long as you want them to, even overnight if you want, your take home drugs are dispensed before you go to theatre & for many ops you go home the same day, I only stayed overnight once when I had a hysterectomy, my dp was able to stay overnight with me, I went in at 6.00pm, theatre.at 7.00pm & by just after 8.00pm I was back in bed watching soaps.

CFEC Tue 24-Aug-21 15:58:19
I've been saying for years that it should be privatised/ or have an income threshold to be able to access it and YES I KNOW it couldn't be as simple as that, but SOMETHING needs to be done as ultimately, through no fault of the hard working employees, it just isn't fit for purpose anymore and seems to be failing just as many people as it's helping.

So your solution to politically motivated underfunding is to allow private companies to make a profit? I hope you get your Op soon but you lost a little bit of sympathy off me there. The last think we need is an American style health care system.