Review of spinal expert John Bradley Williamson identifies poor surgical technique, record-keeping and communication with patients
A leading spinal surgeon’s botched operations left patients with serious blood loss, long-term pain and mobility problems, a damning report has revealed.
It found that John Bradley Williamson’s “unacceptable and unprofessional behaviour” severely or moderately harmed 20 patients at Salford Royal hospital, once regarded as one of England’s safest.
Continue reading...Brian Bell says ministers have let social care become reliant on low-paid and vulnerable foreign workers
Ministers have allowed England’s creaking social care system to become too heavily reliant on low-paid foreign workers who are vulnerable to exploitation, the government’s migration adviser has warned.
In a strongly worded intervention, Prof Brian Bell, who has just been reappointed by the home secretary, Suella Braverman, as chair of the migration advisory committee (MAC), called the government’s tacit acceptance of exploitation in the sector “appalling”.
Continue reading...Watchdog warns that admin errors, unexplained cancellations and delayed scan reports all contribute to longer waits for patients
Patients with suspected cancer are waiting months for diagnosis because of hidden waiting lists or falling into a “black hole” after referral, England’s patient champion warns this weekend.
Admin errors, unexplained cancellations and delayed scan reports are among factors contributing to longer waits, according to Healthwatch England, a committee of the Care Quality Commission.
Continue reading...In today’s newsletter: From poor dentist pay to rising prices and low governmental investment, NHS dentistry has slowly fallen apart – this is how
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In 2021 more than 2,000 dentists quit the NHS, and in 2022 a BBC survey found that nine out of 10 of the dental practices that still offer NHS services are not accepting new adult patients – eight in 10 are not taking on any more children. That has left millions without access to basic healthcare, resulting in “dental deserts” across England, and the problem is only set to get worse as more and more dentists leave the profession.
Banks | Dame Alison Rose, the chief executive of NatWest Group, has stood down after a row over the closure of Nigel Farage’s bank account with the private bank Coutts, which NatWest owns.
Education | Smartphones should be banned from schools to tackle classroom disruption, improve learning and help protect children from cyberbullying, a landmark report by Unesco has recommended. The UN’s education, science and culture agency said there was evidence that excessive use reduced educational performance and emotional stability in children.
Italy | Five people have died in the past 24 hours as two extreme weather events split Italy between wildfires in the south and violent storms in the north. Fires in Sicily led to the temporary closure of Palermo airport after temperatures in the city climbed to 47C on Monday.
Transport | Railway workers who wear stickers supporting a campaign to stop the closure of almost 1,000 ticket offices are being threatened with disciplinary action, the National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers (RMT) has said.
Saudi Arabia | The kingdom has spent at least $6.3bn in sports deals since early 2021, more than quadruple the previous amount spent over a six-year period, in what critics have labelled an effort to distract from its human rights record.
Continue reading...Regulator acts after firm paid millions by NHS for healthcare gave patients wrong chemotherapy dose
Britain’s health regulator has partly suspended the manufacturing licence of Sciensus, a private company paid millions by the NHS to provide vital medicines, after the death of a cancer patient who was given the wrong dose of chemotherapy.
The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) said it had taken “immediate” action under regulation 28 of the Human Medicines Regulations 2012 law “where it appears to the MHRA that in the interests of safety the licence should be suspended”.
Continue reading...Cases of dementia, diabetes, cancer, depression and kidney disease expected to soar as growing numbers reach old age
Nine million people in England will be living with major illnesses such as dementia, diabetes, cancer, depression and kidney disease by 2040, according to projections health leaders called “catastrophic”.
In a rapidly ageing population, the number living with serious diseases will rise from almost one in six of the adult population in 2019, to nearly one in five by 2040, with huge implications for the NHS, social care and the public finances.
Continue reading...Ambulance service allegedly kept information about patients that died hidden from coroner
An ambulance trust accused of hiding information from a coroner about patients that died is keeping a damning internal report about the deaths secret, the Guardian can reveal. A consultant paramedic implicated in the alleged cover-ups continues to be involved in decisions to keep the report from the public.
Earlier this month, North East Ambulance Service (NEAS) apologised to relatives after a review into claims it covered up errors by paramedics and withheld evidence from the local coroner about the deceased patients. But a bereaved family left in the dark about mistakes made before their daughter’s death have rejected the apology.
In the UK and Ireland, Samaritans can be contacted on 116 123, or email jo@samaritans.org or jo@samaritans.ie. In the US, the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline is 1-800-273-8255. In Australia, the crisis support service Lifeline is 13 11 14. Other international helplines can be found at befrienders.org.
Continue reading...Exclusive: health leaders and MPs warn of ‘perfect storm’ in which children wait ‘in agony’ for treatment
Thousands of children in England are experiencing “heartbreaking” long waits for NHS dental care, with some waiting “in agony” for years to have teeth extracted, according to shocking new figures.
Health leaders and MPs warned of a “perfect storm” in which children are struggling to access dentists to nip minor issues “in the bud”, and then facing horrific waiting times for operations to fix problems that have spiralled out of control.
Continue reading...Sir Stephen Powis says two-day strike over pay will cause most severe impact ever seen in the NHS as result of industrial action
Planned NHS hospital care in England will be “virtually at a standstill” on Thursday and Friday when consultants stage their first strike in a decade, the service’s top doctor said.
Their two-day strike over pay will cause “the most severe impact we have ever seen in the NHS as a result of industrial action”, Prof Sir Stephen Powis said on Wednesday.
Continue reading...Jaxson’s symptoms were initially dismissed by health staff in a case that could have had fatal consequences
Soon after her son Jaxson was born, Lauren Clarke spotted that his eyes were yellow and bloodshot. “We kept asking if he had jaundice, but each time we were told to keep feeding him and just put Jaxson in front of a window,” she says.
It was only when Clarke was readmitted six days later with an infection that Jaxson’s jaundice was detected by a midwife. By this time, his levels were becoming dangerously high.
Continue reading...Kimberley Sampson and Samantha Mulcahy died in 2018 after caesarean sections by the same surgeon in Kent
A coroner has criticised an NHS trust over the deaths of two new mothers with herpes.
Kimberley Sampson, 29, and Samantha Mulcahy, 32, died in 2018 after having caesarean sections six weeks apart by the same surgeon at hospitals in Kent.
Continue reading...Education Secretary Gillian Keegan urges BMA to ‘look at’ pay offer as union says proposed increase fails to address years of underpay
Almost 1,000 workers at Gatwick Airport, including baggage handlers and check-in staff, are to strike in a dispute over pay.
Members of Unite employed by four private contractors will walk out for four days from 28 July and again for four days from 4 August, PA reported.
Our members at Gatwick airport undertake incredibly demanding roles and are essential to keeping the airport and airlines working, yet their employers somehow think it is acceptable to pay them a pittance.
As part of Unite’s unyielding focus on the jobs, pay and condition of its members, the union has drawn a line in the sand and is committed to eradicating the scourge of low pay at the airport.
It is a good use to have all kids in school.
That’s not what we want headteachers doing all of their days. But to be honest, right now, if that works to get somebody in school, it’s worth it.
Continue reading...Health unions suggest industrial action likely to continue as Gillian Keegan defends 6% rise on the table
A senior cabinet minister has urged health unions to take the government’s pay offer “seriously”, after union bosses warned the proposed deal would drive doctors out of the profession and could lead to further strikes.
Gillian Keegan, the education secretary, defended the offer of a 6% pay rise for junior doctors a day after the government accepted the recommendations of the public sector pay review bodies.
Continue reading...Public service workers in England offered 5%-7% rises but departments must fund them from existing budgets
Health union leaders have reacted furiously to a warning from Rishi Sunak that his offer of a 6% pay rise this year was final and that “no amount of strikes” would change his mind, as they began their longest walkout yet in England.
The British Medical Association said the government was “driving doctors away” from the health service and had missed an opportunity to put a credible pay offer on the table to end strikes when it accepted all the recommendations of the pay review bodies.
Continue reading...HC-One employed nurse at Tower Bridge Care Centre, which was found to be ‘not safe’ by inspectors
One of Britain’s biggest care home companies employed an 80-year-old senior nurse in a short-staffed care home who was older than some residents and not strong enough to help lift them.
HC-One employed the octogenarian at Tower Bridge Care Centre, which was found by inspectors to be “inadequate” and “not safe”, in a case that highlights a chronic shortage of care workers across the UK.
Continue reading...London-born musician Dumile Daniel Thompson, 49, had a lack of oxygen to his brain after a reaction to a blood pressure drug
An NHS trust has apologised for the substandard care given to MF Doom, an underground rap icon who died aged 49 while having hospital treatment.
The artist behind songs including Accordion and That’s That, whose real name was Dumile Daniel Thompson, died in October 2020 due to a lack of oxygen to his brain after a reaction to a drug prescribed for blood pressure.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Experts say fall in funding caused ‘turning point’ in standards in health service in England
The quality of care that the NHS provides has got worse in many key areas and patients’ long waits to access treatment could become even more common, research has found.
The coalition government’s austerity programme in the early 2010s led to the heath service no longer being able to meet key waiting time targets, the Nuffield Trust and Health Foundation said.
Fewer people with long-term heath conditions such as cancer, diabetes and depression, are getting enough help to manage their condition.
Breast cancer screening rates for women aged 53-74 have fallen.
It has become harder for patients to see a named GP.
Only 6% of midwives think their maternity unit has enough staff to do its job properly.
Continue reading...In today’s newsletter: Staff are leaving in droves, wait times have tripled and critics say it’s locked in a ‘death spiral’. But the situation might not be terminal, with some big changes
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Good morning, and a heartfelt happy birthday to the NHS, which was launched by Labour health minister Nye Bevan on this day in 1948. Don’t hold your breath for champagne and cake on your local hospital trust’s budget, though – you will be waiting almost as long as a typical queue at the nearest A&E.
The NHS may be profoundly cherished for its millions of dedicated staff and the still astonishing cradle-to-grave principle that underpins it, but there is no question that the UK’s healthcare system is very sick. More people are dying waiting for ambulances. Waiting times for treatment have almost tripled since 2020. GP surgeries and mental health services are at breaking point. Staff are leaving in droves, and nurses, junior doctors and even consultants are striking – once an unimaginable prospect – over pay and patient safety.
Climate | The government is drawing up plans to drop the UK’s flagship £11.6bn climate and nature funding pledge. A leaked briefing note to ministers seen by the Guardian, lays out reasons for dropping the UK’s contribution to the fund for developing countries. The Foreign Office initially refused to comment on the leak, before describing it as “false”.
Partygate | Scotland Yard is reopening its investigation into potential Covid breaches at a lockdown party at Conservative headquarters. The force will also scrutinise an event in parliament that the Tory MP Bernard Jenkin – a member of the privileges committee that produced a highly critical report into Boris Johnson – is said to have attended.
Jenin | Israeli forces have withdrawn from the Palestinian city of Jenin, military officials have said, after carrying out one of the biggest operations in the occupied West Bank in years. Twelve Palestinians and an Israeli soldier were killed in the operation.
UK news | Private bank Coutts has reportedly shut Nigel Farage’s bank account after he fell below the prestigious lender’s wealth requirements, raising questions over the Brexiter’s claims that the bank was targeting him over his political views.
Scotland | Mhairi Black, the SNP’s deputy Westminster leader, will step down at the next general election, blaming the “toxic” environment in Westminster. Black became the youngest MP in 350 years when she was elected in the SNP landslide of 2015 at the age of 20, described the Commons as “one of the most unhealthy workplaces that you could ever be in”.
Continue reading...Former PM says service needs radical reform, including pointing patients to private healthcare offers
The NHS must undergo radical change or it will continue to decline and lose public support, Tony Blair has argued on the service’s 75th anniversary.
It must embrace a revolution in technology to reshape its relationship with patients and make much more use of private healthcare providers to cut waiting times, the former Labour prime minister says.
Continue reading...Health service shown to be under some of worst pressure in its history in week Rishi Sunak launched plan to retain and recruit workforce
• ‘You start thinking you will crack’: former NHS tell their stories
Nearly 170,000 workers left their jobs in the NHS in England last year, in a record exodus of staff struggling to cope with some of the worst pressures ever seen in the country’s health system, the Observer can reveal.
More than 41,000 nurses were among those who left their jobs in NHS hospitals and community health services, with the highest leaving rate for at least a decade. The number of staff leaving overall rose by more than a quarter in 2022, compared to 2019.
Continue reading...