Sort of confirmed my suspicions

[vetran]

The old Palmerston "bag of gold" budget approach did have its better points, not least telling the organisation that this is what you have to spend this year and when it's gone, it's gone. That only went wrong when at year end the organisation started (a)_ spending all of it whether they needed to or not and (b) going into debt to prove they needed more. Using the profit motive only reverses that concept, it doesn't make it more efficient.

When the MOD started accounting properly, part of the handover uncovered a lot of strange practices, not least of which was the team buying futures in ship coal - when they hadn't had a coal-fired ship for 30 years or more.

Accountants and Auditors understand profit and know to lookout for weird patterns. Measuring profit and costs against others is an easy way to make sure you are doing a reasonable job. I used to measure how much process X cost in various companies in the group and took the best bits and built a cheap & effective process then rolled it out across all the sites.

[malvolio]

Accountants and Auditors understand profit and know to lookout for weird patterns. Measuring profit and costs against others is an easy way to make sure you are doing a reasonable job. I used to measure how much process X cost in various companies in the group and took the best bits and built a cheap & effective process then rolled it out across all the sites.

Yes, understood. I've run P&Ls as well as Project budgets. The difference to business as we understand it and the NHS is that every business budget element had to be costed and justified and any increases went through a change process, whereas the NHS operates politically through a hierarchy of committees, most of whom are well removed form the actual purpose of the operation.

[vetran]

Yes, understood. I've run P&Ls as well as Project budgets. The difference to business as we understand it and the NHS is that every business budget element had to be costed and justified and any increases went through a change process, whereas the NHS operates politically through a hierarchy of committees, most of whom are well removed form the actual purpose of the operation.

yep so lets change that so it actually takes responsibility.

[hugebrain]

British patients spend significantly longer in hospital for the same operations and procedures compared with other countries

hah. When I had an operation in the UK they didn’t even bother to stitch the wound shut afterwards. When they sent me home I was still bleeding and had to sit on a bunch of towels so the blood didn’t soak through to the car seat.

I can assure you it’s not like that in other countries.

[jamesbrown]

hah. When I had an operation in the UK they didn’t even bother to stitch the wound shut afterwards. When they sent me home I was still bleeding and had to sit on a bunch of towels so the blood didn’t soak through to the car seat.

I can assure you it’s not like that in other countries.

Perhaps the surgeon was familiar with your CUK posting history.

[darmstadt]

Even if if not used:

https://www.theguardian.com/society/...pitals-omicron
https://bylinetimes.com/2022/01/14/s...s-sound-alarm/

https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/politi...javid-25512112
https://www.thenational.scot/news/19...health-sector/

[OwlHoot]

hah. When I had an operation in the UK they didn’t even bother to stitch the wound shut afterwards...

Unstitched wound? Luxury! When I was sent home, I had an unstitched wound, and I was pulling wadding out of it for a week, like a conjuror pulling hankies out of their mouth, and when I jumped up and down I rattled like a bag of spanners from all the forceps and clamps they'd left in. And when you tell that to young people today, they won't believe you!

[SimonMac]

Of course why didn't anyone think of this before, so we just need to get people out of hospital sooner....

Given a large portion of the people who are in hospital for an extended time are elderly tell me again how we do that? Discharge people to social care? Get people to look after their own elderly relatives? Oooops!

Unfortunately there is no quick or simple answer, which is why government after government (both Red and Blue) have gotten us into this situation.

[vetran]

Of course why didn't anyone think of this before, so we just need to get people out of hospital sooner....

Given a large portion of the people who are in hospital for an extended time are elderly tell me again how we do that? Discharge people to social care? Get people to look after their own elderly relatives? Oooops!

Unfortunately there is no quick or simple answer, which is why government after government (both Red and Blue) have gotten us into this situation.

Other countries manage it, so it is that simple. Measure against your peers.

[WTFH]

Other countries manage it, so it is that simple. Measure against your peers.

How do other countries manage it?