Healthcare - NHS/Private

[minestrone]

I'm lucky enough to live in a village with an excellent surgery. Appointments the same day or the next are the norm and the receptionists can tell who you are just by your voice. GP's on a first name basis and plenty of time to talk through issues.

This is how it should be but for the majority it's just a dream. How to fix it?

You did say last week that your village was populated by white middle class.

[Cliphead]

You did say last week that your village was populated by white middle class.

Yes, can't deny that but I can choose where I live and just one more benefit.

[minestrone]

I have faith in the NHS up to a point.

Told this story before on the forum, the wife's aunt was terminally ill and left in a corridor, family asked her to deal with the situation, when she got there asked for a morphine patch to be given, short story is that the nurse told her "you know nothing about medicine" then the shit: storm happened

[ZARDOZ]

Replies in Bold

In most cases.

"Of those doctors undertaking private practice, the large majority also work in NHS Consultant posts, doing their private work in their spare time, outside of and on top of their NHS commitments. A small proportion of doctors work in full time private practice only."

http://surgicalcareers.rcseng.ac.uk/...ndant-practice

[SueEllen]

I have faith in the NHS up to a point.

Told this story before on the forum, the wife's aunt was terminally ill and left in a corridor, family asked her to deal with the situation, when she got there asked for a morphine patch to be given, short story is that the nurse told her "you know nothing about medicine" then the tulip storm happened

Stupid nurse - statistically there is one person in every extended family who qualified in something medical.

[SueEllen]

Indeed.

At my GP's practice they basically don't answer the phone. I mean, they do, sometimes - just takes a good 15 mins to get through, and it's not because they're on another call.

I've started to just drive down there to make appointments. It's quicker. Once there, they can't ignore you the way they ignore the phone...

That's what I tell everyone to do in London unless they are in pain or dying.

If you are in pain the receptionist has to let you see the GP as an emergency and if you are dying you should go to A&E.

[norrahe]

Our GP in numptonshire were awful, you were no sooner in the door and they had the prescription pad out.

I'm asthmatic and there's no history of it in the family, it only came on a few years ago due to an allergy but it took me 3 years to find it out despite asking the doctor repeatedly to refer me to a respiratory specialist and get allergy tests done.

Mr N had recurring back problems and the doctors kept giving him pain killers and sending him on his way, he kept asking for a referral to a private doc as he had bupa, it took about a year before he finally got a doctor to sort it out and it turned out he needed surgery and physio.

It does vary from surgery to surgery, had one set of doctors that were great, I was on medicine which needed to be supervised, so they ensured I was in on a monthly basis, when I moved and changed to the numptonshire surgery they just put me on repeat prescription and never bothered keeping tabs.

[sasguru]

Our GP in numptonshire were awful, you were no sooner in the door and they had the prescription pad out.

I'm asthmatic and there's no history of it in the family, it only came on a few years ago due to an allergy but it took me 3 years to find it out despite asking the doctor repeatedly to refer me to a respiratory specialist and get allergy tests done.

Mr N had recurring back problems and the doctors kept giving him pain killers and sending him on his way, he kept asking for a referral to a private doc as he had bupa, it took about a year before he finally got a doctor to sort it out and it turned out he needed surgery and physio.

It does vary from surgery to surgery, had one set of doctors that were great, I was on medicine which needed to be supervised, so they ensured I was in on a monthly basis, when I moved and changed to the numptonshire surgery they just put me on repeat prescription and never bothered keeping tabs.

And this is why its worth paying £70 for one visit to a private GP.
The £70 allows you to tell them what to do:
"I'd like an appt with a BUPA specialist please".
"Yes siree 3 bags full sir, when would you like it, here's a list, which is closest to you?".
Job done.
Stop poncing about with the NHS, if enough of us did it , I think people would start to notice.

[norrahe]

And this is why its worth paying £70 for one visit to a private GP.
The £70 allows you to tell them what to do:
"I'd like an appt with a BUPA specialist please".
"Yes siree 3 bags full sir, when would you like it, here's a list, which is closest to you?".
Job done.
Stop poncing about with the NHS, if enough of us did it , I think people would start to notice.

Which is why I started on private doctors in the city and now don't have to worry about blighty nhs anymore, since I don't live there

The doctors seem nice at the cloggy surgery and it all operates on health insurance anyway.

[socialworker]

I wasn't going to get sucked into this one but this is just my view as Ive worked alongside the NHS at various points from 1980, going on wards a lot etc.

1. there are loads, and I mean a majority of really good people working in the NHS. They work really hard and most of the time they manage to cover up for the chronic underresourcing that has been going on for years. But sometimes they just get tired of fighting and then it all goes belly up - it takes contant vigilance to look after folk properly and when good staff get burned out and leave all that is left is the poor staff. You can get good wards and bad wards on the same hospital.

2. chronic underresourcing again. In 1981 I worked in the UCH group in London - I used to run outings for the long stay wards and I could take 6 student nurses from 2 or 3 wards as escorts without leaving them short. Now you could not take any staff member off a ward. Ratios of qualified nurses are vastly under the legal requirement in the US AFAIK.

2aNurses have been treated like tulip by NHS management ever since I can remember and nowadays able girls have a lot more choices.

3. Constant managerialist interference - people who can only see things as a flow chart. When there is a problem the only solutions they see are more managerialist interference - more forms to fill in - until the staff are drowning in the stuff. You will get into trouble for not following a procedure but not necessarily for neglecting a patient. In both health and social services, using your initiative, disagreeing with something you think is a mistake will have you marked as a troublemaker.

4. The reason your GP is reluctant to refer you to a specialist is likely to be because they are under all sorts of pressures and threat NOT to refer. It's called Referral Management.

5. Whistleblowing was and still is the worst thing you can do for your career in the NHS imo despite all the rhetoric. Middle managers like ward sisters who are completely bullied and browbeaten into not speaking up.

6 Disempowerment generally of clinical staff. People may not have liked it when the consultant was god but they could get things changed. The doctor who blew the whistle on the Bristol childrens heart scandal in the 80s had to leave the UK and has never been able to work here since. The consultant paediatrician who complained about the serious underresourcing in Haringey where Baby P happened was hounded out of her job. That's just two off the top of my head. The ex nurse I trained with who was told he could never work in the NHS again because he exposed a scam stealing money from people in long stay hospitals - ok 30 years ago but I doubt it has changed that much.

These are bad tings but in my view they are not reasons for destroying the NHS. PUtting profitability at the top of list will not improve things, neither will so called choice - it is a sop to those who think they can control everything in their lives but when you are in a car crash or you are 89 and fall over in your kitchen, you need to know that whatever hospital you are taken to, it will be up to scratch.

Most people alive in the UK today have no idea what it is like to live somewhere where you can only get medical help if you can afford to pay. By all means expose bad thing when they happen but dont be taken in by forces who want to channel the vast resources of the NHS into their pockets and those of their wealthy friends.