To think the NHS is screwed

[jaspercabbage]

Elderly relative had cancer related surgery before Christmas. The surgery went well but there has been no follow up appointment with an oncologist since. Recently they have taken ill again (clearly to do with the cancer) and have been to a&e four times in two weeks. They are treated for the sickness then sent on their way for the same thing to happen a few days later.

They were admitted again earlier in the week and have been stuck on a trolley, in a bay, in a&e for two nights now due to no beds in the hospital. This is an elderly person quite possibly now requiring end of life care and they can't even have their family with them. I just can't believe it's this bad.

I'm also due to have a baby later in the year, could be complications and to be honest I am shit scared about staff shortages and aftercare. What if something goes wrong in labour and there is nobody to deal with it at the time?

How can things have got to this point? The people are crying out for life going back to normal clearly haven't had to visit hospital lately. Although this is probably to do with a lot more than covid - underfunding, Brexit at so on.

Just a rant really but interested to hear other peoples thoughts.

How is your relative? Call the hospital switchboard and ask to be put through to the palliative care team. Often end of life patients aren’t referred to them. Ask the palliative care team to review and that if appropriate they can arrange for transfer home and district nurses/local hospice nurses to care for him. Quicker than waiting for the ward to decide in my experience

@Imnotafemistbut

You were a bit Flora. You were on about "wars" and "billions going into Tory mates pockets" or something.

Your post had nothing to do with the subject as far as I could see, that's why I said you were on a rant.

You’ve got the wrong poster as that was not me, maybe you need to pay and get your eyes tested

I have lived thru nationalized industries, the trains were better and afordable, the buses outside london were better.

I lived through them as well. When I bought my first flat, there was a two year waiting list for a phone connection --- in 1987! After five years in the US, where the phone was connected within 24 hours of placing the order because it was a market, and if one company didn't respond there were other options, I just got fed up and hijacked someone else's paper work to have the phone jack wired in. Once I had done that, there was no good reason to cut off a willing paying customer.

And British Rail only survived by pricing demand off the track... said to me, face to face, during a recorded interview by a senior director of British Rail, who had ended up at Railtrack... for whom I was writing an audited public statement/their annual report.

I left the NHS just before covid, I work in the private sector. All my patients are NHS the contact was won by the company. Working for them is better but i want to leave the profession.

State monopolies deliver shabby services to people who don't know how to judge what a decent service looks like, and who are grateful for any help at all. When you are ill or pregnant, all help looks wonderful. At it's best, and my current breast cancer is still a live story: I had an appointment today; the NHS is excellent, if you are able to be your own care advocate. The care is good/competent, and the staff are awesome. But there are two sides to this, and both are visible on Mumsnet. One is the cancer support thread, which is lovely, cosy and supportive, and well-informed too, but which looks after the victims of cancer and there's here, where we are discussing what a better version of the NHS should look like, and how the 2.0 version we'd all like to see can be brought into existence. Keeping the caring intact, but delivering greater efficiency is (I hope and like to think) what everybody who has posted wants. Or am I fooling myself?

Nobody wants to see the end of the NHS, but the cost of medical advances run ahead of the funding allocated (years ago) to those services. Meanwhile the newspapers continue to announce new and better (and more expensive) treatment breakthroughs and miracle drugs that could help Great Uncle Arthur. And because it's the NHS, and free to use at the point of delivery, it's my right. Great Uncle Arthur needs six more months.

@XingMing

State monopolies deliver shabby services to people who don't know how to judge what a decent service looks like, and who are grateful for any help at all. When you are ill or pregnant, all help looks wonderful. At it's best, and my current breast cancer is still a live story: I had an appointment today; the NHS is excellent, if you are able to be your own care advocate. The care is good/competent, and the staff are awesome. But there are two sides to this, and both are visible on Mumsnet. One is the cancer support thread, which is lovely, cosy and supportive, and well-informed too, but which looks after the victims of cancer and there's here, where we are discussing what a better version of the NHS should look like, and how the 2.0 version we'd all like to see can be brought into existence. Keeping the caring intact, but delivering greater efficiency is (I hope and like to think) what everybody who has posted wants. Or am I fooling myself?

The NHS is reasonably efficient. Greater efficiency is pretty far down the list of what I’d like to see from an improved NHS. In fact a lot of what I’d like to see (e.g. increased focus on developing effective treatment for some areas that are not well served, such as mental health, better focus on informed consent and educating the public) would probably not be possible with a strong focus on efficiency.

I lived through them as well. When I bought my first flat, there was a two year waiting list for a phone connection --- in 1987! After five years in the US, where the phone was connected within 24 hours of placing the order because it was a market, and if one company didn't respond there were other options, I just got fed up and hijacked someone else's paper work to have the phone jack wired in

Your just making stuff up now to suit your argument, which reading through your posts is not uncommon.
There has never been 2 year waits, i worked in main exchanges in the 80s as the GPO went to BT.
Wired Jumper field changes is what livens up a line to a property, these are done in cabinet and the exchange, in the 3 exchanges i worked in we would do 1000s per week and when i went to wholesale and CPE, copper was put in within a few weeks to new builds, so UG over head, internal wiring the lot.
System X and Y were also being introduced so far less physical work to provide physical lines.

You wouldn't be in a position to "hijack" someone's paper work, all records would be wrong inc billing, i couldn't and i was a TO.

plus in 1988, BT had been privatised for over 4 years, which also blows a hole in your thinking.

The problem is efficiency in tory circles usually means cutting staff to bone.
Computer says x ward only needs 4 nurses on duty but in reality should have 8 due to patient dependency.
I'm all for a mix of state and private but companies like serco, G5 and the like which are just private versions of state monopolies, are equally as inept, less transparent and more expensive. Look at how competent utility companies aren't - people actually trust companies like this to run the NHS ?
utility companies

@GPOTech, I defer to your greater knowledge of telephony and wiring procedures! However, I did buy a top floor conversion in NW6 in 1987 and there was no wiring within that property. When I asked BT, which was about 50% state-owned until 1991, for a connection they told me it would be up to a two year wait. But the people who moved in on the floor below who had a phone at their previous address received the letter saying that their wiring would be installed if they called to make an appointment. So I did and it was duly wired up, at which point I applied for an account. My understanding was that it was a shortage of numbers, and well as the bureaucracy... because not long after, London was split into 0207 and 0208 systems.

And your suggestion that I make stuff up is insulting.

That's why the NHS won't survive, people are living with very poor health for the last decade of life. Social care is woefully underfunded I know someone who was bed bound with contractures and on end of life pathway but had been that way for 3 years. 3 Years !!! You could tell from the tears in her eyes and refusing food she wanted to go but no needed to give her more medication to keep her living.

We wouldn't treat animals like that but we do humans. Care and medical treatment is much more expensive than when the NHS was funded and it's only going to get worse.

Xing So the developer not installing wiring at the time of conversion and not arranging for a cable to be run to the building is BT's responsibility?
Presumably a private development company (that you are keen on) screwed up that vital bit of infrastructure?

You are blaming BT for stuff that a private company got wrong.

Wiring within a building (not owned or installed by BT) is nothing to do with them, their responsibility would end at the NTP, the network termination point.

London was 017 and 018, moved to 020 number ranges in 2000, so 13 years after you had these issues.

@GPOTech, The "developer" converted a house he bought or inherited (IDK) into three flats -- ground floor and garden for his daughter, and two for sale. He wasn't a development company in the modern sense. And clearly as a private individual, he got the telephone wiring wrong.

You are also right in pointing out that it was of course the 017 and 018 number ranges: I remembered when I was walking the dog!

It is the Tories. They have been deliberately underfunding the NHS for years, so their cronies can take up the massive profits from privatisation. It's their whole ethos ffs! They were opposed to the NHS in the first place.

Anyone who cannot or will not see this - it's probably because they voted Tory for their own I'm alight jack reasons. I'm sorry but it's true.

I'm not a Labour voter either btw, I voted Greens. However my personal experience has been that waiting times were so so much lower in the Blair years.

I've waited over a year - yes that's not a typo - to see an ENT consultant. I have a lump in my neck and I previously had a tumour on the same side removed 20 years ago. The GP doesn't think it's 2-week-cancer pathway stuff as it's not growing rapidly, but still it could be potentially dodgy. It would have been 8 weeks wait pre Tories. I'm still waiting A YEAR later. Mental health provision is just non existant now compared to pre Tory years.

I agree though about the ridiculousness of some people. I know people who run to the GP or A&E for very minor things which could easily be monitored or treated at home or pharmacy. It's the loss of basic medical 'granny' knowledge people have now I think. Don't know the answer to that though.

@Valeriana87 My thoughts too, i fairly recently had to pay 3k for a 20min operation, if i hadn't i'd have lost my job, NHS had 2 to 3 year wait and this was in late 2019.

Fil and Mil have between then spent 15k on 2 operations.

This nothing to do with Private vs State, its purely down to funding, both in equipment and staff... why else charge 50k to become a HCP ?

...just heard Truss used a Private Jet for a recent trip to Australia - cost 500k... so plenty of money to spend on themselves and fuck the environment.

Abuse of position is hideous, the private jet anecdote is abhorrent.

But DH paid £6k to correct a vision problem (because he was informed his cataracts would prohibit him from driving within 6 months, at under 62). The local NHS list said he'd get the fix in 18-24 months, by when he'd have been blind. Working person, paying tax, nearing 40%. So, private.

At the same time, DM's cataracts (retired, 85) worsened, but (a few months before COVID kicked off) her local health trust in another area, decided to kill the waiting list and scheduled four weeks of weekend surgeries to decimate the waiting list.

Obviously, I didn't want my mum to go blind and all that would have entailed, but surely the NHS ought to be capable of classifying priority. To a degree, that's what irks me. Why would you/the NHS pull out all the stops for an old and unproductive person and throw obstacles in the path of the person who is still actively at work?

I do love my mum but for this question, she's just a random geriatric.

Obviously, I didn't want my mum to go blind and all that would have entailed, but surely the NHS ought to be capable of classifying priority. To a degree, that's what irks me. Why would you/the NHS pull out all the stops for an old and unproductive person and throw obstacles in the path of the person who is still actively at work

I think its assessed on clinical need and certainly i have been moved up the list due to work/age considerations in the past but now the NHS is run on Govt short term handouts to solve long term problems.

So where i am, the Govt is giving out a load of money to solve NHS Dental waiting lists but you have to be a registered NHS patient (a rarity here) and the money stops in March .... so get a cavity in April and well, lets say you wont be getting it fixed and so it goes on, waste of money!

Just seen the amounts student loans start to be repaid has been frozen, should have gone up with earnings.

That'll help our hard pressed HCP's - the aim is surely to run the NHS into the ground.

@XingMing ‘old and unproductive’ that has a really nasty tone to it. Like economically not worth bothering about.

The NHS is a mis managed Black hole. Cameron had to introduce austerity measures because the previous Labour government left money. Anyone like to guess how many billions are still outstanding from Blairs PFI ?
THE NHS needs to getrid of the pointless layers of management on big fat salaries and bring the wasteful spending under control.

YANBU

I didn't really understand fully until I needed the NHS myself and gave birth at the start of the year.
My waters broke New Year's Eve and I was sent home as no room on labour ward, spent over 24 hours on triage ward being promised top of list for labour ward but didn't get through until after 5pm on the 2nd Jan.
ended in emergency c section due to length of time my waters had been broken without my getting on hormone drip (due to shortages).
The nearest midwife unit to me was completely shut due to Covid isolation so everyone sent to this hospital

I was discharged immediately next day after listening to nurses discuss needing beds
They were so understaffed and pressured

@Georgeskitchen

The NHS is a mis managed Black hole. Cameron had to introduce austerity measures because the previous Labour government left money. Anyone like to guess how many billions are still outstanding from Blairs PFI ? THE NHS needs to getrid of the pointless layers of management on big fat salaries and bring the wasteful spending under control.

Have you heard of the Global Financial Crash in 2008/9 ? with 100s of billions spent to avoid banks going bust? No country in the dev world had 10 years of Austerity, which is why are country is in such a mess.

New hospitals had to be built and paid for, either PFI or Borrowing - what would you prefer? how many billions wasted on Tory out sourcing companies that when went bust?

Without effective management, bad business and clinical decisions get made, leading to the inefficiencies you are so concerned about.