Magic Bullet

Charity begins at home!
Perhaps if the whole NHS was re-hauled, GPs were put into A&E or had drop-in centres, both or something like that, perhaps the A&E would be less crammed. More nurses properly trained, not those who don't "do vomit and poo", it used to be a vocation, now it seems that it is a career! We need more beds, and what happened to the convalescent homes of yore?

And, yes, people should take more care of their own health, but there are people who suffer from what GPs describe as SLS or "Sh.t Life Syndrome"! The poor are always much less able to control their health.

Having said that - the NHS staff work their socks off under horrible circumstances, doing their ver best for their patients...They are patient, caring and are heroes.

We need to get rid of the bureaucrats many of whom are paid more than senior doctors and certainly, nurses, including their bonus payments!! as well as huge pensions and lump-sum handouts. With the money saved, we can re-open all A and E departments and wards, recruit staff properly and pay them adequately, and finance social care for the elderly so they have some dignity in their last days/months/years. We need to put doctors and senior nurses in charge of health. Finally, we need to invest in training throughout the country to ensure the future and look after the staff so they don't emigrate to other countries offering better environments/wages and support.

I believe it all began with the closure of A&E departments and promises that by closing some and upgrading others will give everyone a much more efficient NHS. I cannot understand how having less emergency departments gives a better service. Where I live they have closed 3 A&Es. (Royal Free Trust). This cannot provide a better service. I collapsed a couple of weeks before Christmas and husband called 999. A paramedic was with us in minutes and an ambulance arrived soon after it was called for. We had a wait in the corridor of 2 hours. During this time 'my' ambulance could not be used as I was on their trolley being looked after by the crew until I could be transferred. I was admitted and was in for 4 nights. But it was like musical chairs waiting for a bed. I had to sleep 2 nights in the ressus ward. I also agree that there are 'fat cats' and a lot of money wasted. The service is top heavy with officers and not enough soldiers. But however many there are on the ground, while they take away the services by closures and mergers this will go on. A bigger population with less services cannot work. I worry what will be there for our grandchildren.

Fitzy54..... you've seen no convincing evidence that large companies owe billions in tax! Get real. Try reading 'The Great Tax Robbery' by Richard Brooks. Your eyes will be opened, I think.

I believe the whole system is flawed from how we use the NHS and in particular A&E dept to how we take care of our elderly and vulnerable citizens. We have a growing population of who need both, because of the way we live today have no one to turn to for after care in the home when they become ill. The more we depend on the NHS and social services to provide this care for our community the more expensive it'll become.

Good post. Tories didn't inherit a huge debt, they spent billions bailing out the banks. Think it was Norway who let their banks go and they survived. All austerity can be laid at the door of greedy Corporations, corrupt banks and MPs (remember expenses scandal, still continuing). This Government is selling all our services off and you will have to have insurance/pay for healthcare, social care. It is wrong our MPs are allowed to have jobs on company boards when they involved in Parliament. (Steve Webb (ex pensions Minister) now chair of biggest pension company, Royal Life). I feel so much for the younger generation, so much blame laid at the door of the elderly and immigrants etc, when it is just pure greed on the government and their paymasters, corporations.

More beds =more staff needed to look after people .The withdrawal of the bursary for nurses and midwives has seen a big drop in applications for degree courses this Sept .Even if they see sense and reintroduce them there will be a year when we just dont produce enough of the above !If European staff start going home as a result of Brexit we really will be in trouble
The problems in the BUS affect staff as much as patients .Most ,my DD included are hugely stressed and frustrated they cannot do their jobs properly .
And to hear Jeremy Hunt pontificating makes me so angry. He has been Health Sec for some time Its his responsibility to sort it out

Its not only the NHS in the UK, we have the same situation in Sweden, the Health Care System is going under fast, lack of Doctors and Nurses they say, and this amounts to money of course, pay them and they will appear. Another thing here, we pay taxes, plus we pay to see the Doctor, Nurse etc at the Doctors Surgery, pay huge amounts for medicines, to stay in Hospital costs too.
But everything boils down to MONEY, or the lack of it, or wrong spending, funding etc, lets hope all Politicians worldwide waken up soon, before its too late.

Aaagh Autocorrect NHS

A medical centre near me with large waiting times is now offering a private service to run alongside the NHS one. £145 for an appointment without braking the rules apparently. Reason being, they can't get enough doctors. I'd just love now how this improves anything, never mind the really scary 'up-front' privatisation of the NHS.

I watch a programme called Hospital, one week it covered people coming from abroad for treatment, given bills but never paying them, they were in the thousands of pounds, which could have been spent on people who have paid into the system, these people had come into the country specifically to be treated here, why can't we, like other countries make sure we get the money first?

Many good ideas here, but why are they not implemented by successive governments? It's amazing that the most obvious never seems to happen. People wait in ambulances for hours; why can't we have a 'holding area' in hospitals with staff properly briefed by ambulance crew, who are then released to get on with their jobs. Yes, let's have a GP surgery in every A and E so that the idiot who comes in with a painful toe that he has had for a week gets appropriately treated - after a wait - having been told it is neither an accident nor is it an emergency.
How about convalescent homes for the so called bed blockers? This used to be the norm - after surgery or accidents patients were sent to fully recover with appropriate supervision. But who is listening - it seems that incompetence, jobs for the boys, and a situation where those in charge of everything that matters are shielded by big salaries, golden pensions, private healthcare and schooling, and homes in gated enclosures.

We are not wealthy country we are trillions in debt and the burden of that debt has to be borne by our children and grand children.

I despair of the nonsense that suggests everything is affordable because it isn't and all the time is made less affordable by the ways in which we run things. The NHS is massively wasteful and has been for decades. I worked in NHS complaints and could see it every day. We just whitewashed things and learnt nothing.

Charities now are appealing for vols all the time to help with the loneliness issue, drive people to hospital, befriend people etc. The training that goes along with keeping the charities going is bizarre, and doesn't ensure safety for anyone, except the people on salaries at the top of the charity.

When are we going to wake up to the fact, that paying people to do even the simplest things cost a bloody fortune because of the way we do that stuff. The value we get got that money is often appalling.

I remember 'bob a job week' when boy Scouts came and for modest cost did a job that needed doing, now we have these vetted handyman schemes, expensive and deplorable standard at times. We used to have more church visitors and almoners in hospitals and replaced them all with politically correct 'volunteer schemes' and degree qualified people, half of whom could not find their bum with both hands.

We have extracted people's faith in their own neighbours and communities and even strangers to assist them ( although evidence of this is surrounds us. The vetting, training industry is rife and slows things down and no one is safer really, we just think they are.

The environment disables us, traffic moving too fast in built up areas, steep kerbs, lack of benches and public toilets, parks where people with dogs are no longer welcome, where is the life that older people used to enjoy. We are all but kettled in our own homes by the built environment. We are unfit when we can't go for walks and lonely when we can't sit on a bench and chat or potter around the town where they are no facilities.

We have so many things to help us now we ought to be out there in the main stream of life for longer, but are instead another resource for people who want to feel good about themselves to make use of.

Fifteen years ago, I moved into Devon and almost immediately had a knock on my door to inform me that I had to 'water Olive's plants' as the person who usually did it was going on holiday for a fortnight. Olive was blind and rather helpless and I was handed the baton to keep an eye on her as it was deemed my neighbourly duty.and I did it gladly.

We have been encouraged not to trust each other, when that very trust worked for years and the replacements are slow, costly and less accommodating of needs.

Pay more is only part of the solution, do more is instant, caring, personal, rewarding, why don't we just do it?

I am often unable to do much, but manage somehow and would be happy to ask for help if I needed it. I have had to ask strangers to assist a few times, never been refused help and people been happy to help, just as I am happy given the opportunity to help someone.

It is often the very smallest services that people miss.........yet can easily be done by someone who does not need to be more than helpful.

Pretty well agree with all the posters here, but the health tourism mentioned by Marieeliz does make me cross. I don't think.any of us want to see people turned away from hospital when they are in dire need, whatever their nationality, but health insurance should be part of the requirement before a visa is given. Other countries operate this successfully, so why don't we? Obviously this wouldn't apply to EU citizens at the moment, but it could in the future. I'm also aware that the cost involved is claimed to be small in comparison to the whole health budget, I don't know whether it is or not, but I do think that as the health service is not free to us, then neither should it be free for citizens of other countries.

I have lived in the same densely populated part of England for forty years and seen nursing/care homes, both private and council, close one by one. I was in hospital 3 years ago for two weeks with a badly smashed leg and in a neighbouring bed was a lady in her late 80s, so frail I wondered how she was still alive, let alone living by herself with no relatives except a nephew who never came near. The social worker set up a care package and needed someone to be home on her return and the nephew promised to be there. He wasn't but they left her there anyway, cold and with no fresh food. She sat there until the middle of the night then became so fearful that she rang for an ambulance and next day she was back in the hospital, clearly unable to look after herself and bed blocking again. The nurses said she was in more than she was out and there was nowhere else to put her. I called in to the ward six months later when I was able to get myself to the hospital and was shocked to see the nearly blind lady from the next room still there repeating over and over, "Will somebody help me please" just as she had for the two weeks I was on the ward. The nurses said that there were many such patients, their fractures long healed but nowhere to go. Where are the nursing/care homes where they could have been cared for at a much lower cost? Six or so bedblocking patients on an acute Orthopaedic Ward and yet our council every year trumpets that our council tax is frozen for another year, I think this is Year 7 of no rise. Why do they think that makes sense as costs go up and social care is cut to the bone. That hospital is scheduled for closure now and I presume such longstayers will be transferred to a hospital out of our area, just shunting the problem along,

I saw a Lot of health tourists when working in nhs why can't they have to show insurance documents along with passports when travelling legally . I and a lot of other people that know HS2 should be scrapped its not needed doesn't get people to destination much quicker and if it's for capacity why can't you they put more carriages on trains and spend money saved on improving stations my local one asnt got facilities for disabled which is disgusting . Bed blocking is a big problem there needs to be more social care in place a lot of the older people don't want to go home where they are alone most of time . I know we have to help other countries but we need to look at ours first.

Yes, we all need to help. Keep ourselves fit not fat, so many illnesses can be prevented by diet and exercise. Half an hour a day walking is no great effort but brings such benefits.

We definitely need to find a way of looking after the elderly. My much loved MIL has severe dementia and is in a home costing way over £1500 a week as she needs specialist nursing care. We sold her house to pay for this and don't begrudge a penny but the money will run out in a couple of years. Lots of people are not fortunate enough to have a house to sell, who cares for them?

Hospitals too could help themselves. Visiting one recently, the heating was on full blast and all the windows open. We wouldn't do this at home, where we have to pay the bills ourselves. Why don't they buy centrally instead of paying different prices for things in different areas. I know it is our beloved NHS but could it not be run as efficiently as Amazon etc with business people in charge of central purchasing?

Why do we not charge the drunk and disorderly that fill up A&E? After all, they have just spent a small fortune getting drunk in the first place. Health tourism too. In Greece, we have to pay for medical care and then claim back from our insurance. Why not here? Hospitals have to get more efficient, especially when it is not emergency care that is provided.

I am happy to pay a bit more in taxes ringfenced for the NHS and Social Care but what happened to National Insurance payments? Wasn't this supposed to be ringfenced for just those things?

Sorry if this is a bit of a rant!!

I agree with most of the above good posts. and grannimimi has posted an alarming pov regarding what goes into our foods nowadays. One member of very extended family started periods at age 7, her doctor said he was seeing more and more of this. Young girls seem to be entering puberty much earlier, and breasts on young teenage girls seem to get bigger and bigger (I see a lot of this with our clients in the summer!). Surely it has to do with the hormones pumped into food, waste products in the water supply.

Banging on about my usual rant. Joe Public has to get over the idea of 'free at the point of delivery', the NHS has been underfunded since inception, much larger population nowadays, people living longer. It is antediluvian to think this state of affairs can go on and on. The stronger/wealthier members of society should be taking care of those less able/vulnerable, and not just through the voluntary contributions, which are undoubtedly essential.

The administrative system of the NHS is ridiculous and unnecessary. If all took responsibility for themselves instead of relying on these expensive administrators then so much cost cutting would happen. So not having to have the lengthy process of being referred by a GP to a consultant etc, but instead a prescription to source those resources, fix appointments being done by the patient, results delivered to the appropriate medical practioner by the patient would not only cut costs but cut down waiting times.

And why shouldn't those who are able contribute something to the costs of medical care. This is what happens in France and it works. One of my biggest fears of having to return to UK post Brexit is having to submit myself to the care of the NHS, and that is not knocking the medical personnel, just the system. I cannot afford to go privately and anyway I think for anything other than routine procedures you cannot get better than the NHS on the medical side, once you can get there. But how long is it going to be there? Already we see supply of personnel from other countries being reduced, UK doctors going overseas, and many already in the system dropping out because of the parlous state. WAKE UP CALL NEEDED.

The percentage of GDP spent on healthcare is roughly 9% for the UK while for Germany and France it is just over 11% and the USA is a litle over 17% so we run a lean ship for a developed first world economy.

People seem to think that improvements would be seen if money were thrown at the NHS but when Gordon Brown nearly doubled the funding it did not create a Utopian health service. Much of the increase went on salaries and management and amongst unforseen consequences was the way GP's services, hitherto available for the convenience of the patients, became inaccessible during evenings and weekends for a variety of reasons and bookings became almost impossible to secure.

It does not do to become emotive and partisan about the NHS but, like every other area which is developing and changing with technology, science and society itself, a rational approach to problems which arise needs to be taken.

My experience of the NHS concerning a recent cancer scare for my DH is that the structure, administration, speed and medical care offered were first rate while the buildings were a little shabby (though clean). This seemed to be appropriate prioritisation for a national free at point of service institution. If I want five star accommodation I can pay over the odds for private care.

Actually more money has gone into NHS over recent years but there are more people, especially older ones so that's what the problem is. In Germany you provide your own food in hospital or pay for it. In France small fees are paid for doctors appointments etc. In the beginning it cost 8% of GDP and now it's 20%. In 2004 (Labour) I needed a knee replacement so I could work but it was a two year waiting list. My sons paid £7000 for me to go private. In 2012 I had a shoulder replacement privately paid for by NHS and 2013 the other knee replaced by NHS (Conservative).

Some brilliant posts in this thread, which is why it makes me more than a little angry to read in the Sunday press about how much Mr Trump's planned visit is going to cost the tax payers.

Clearly the money is there, but the will to resusitate the NHS is not. It must be in another purse.

Having worked in the public sector for over 20 years I have seen the results of repeated restructuring, slimlining, whatever they want to call it. It invariably ends up with even more bureaucracy, or electronic form filling for the likes of me. This detracts from the time taken for the actual face to face contact. Yes, the government should make sure that everyone pays their fair share, including those from overseas and those who have been dodging tax. And I believe that the NHS and social care should be able to work together more smoothly. But while they are working out how to do this, I would be more than happy if income tax or National Insurance were increased. The NHS might be free at the point of contact, but it isn't actually free. The NHS and social care were not designed for today's world. We are living longer and therefore demanding an increasing number of treatments. How are they managing to increase funds at the moment? Well I know one way; my mother, who is at an advanced stage of dementia, is paying more than £900 per WEEK nursing home fees. It makes my blood boil to know that, having worked hard all their lives, she and people like her are being forced to subsidise the NHS and local authorities, who pay significantly less for those who receive funding, just because she was careful with her money throughout she her life. If that isn't exploiting the vulnerable then I don't know what is. I think I need to calm down now.

As I mentioned on "share" on this Forum. We should ask the Ethiopean Spice Girls to whom we donated millions of our overseas aid, plus we should ask India who have built space craft to give us our money back. That would be a start. Then once out of that ghastly European Union that sucks billions of money from us every year we should reduce our foreign aid budget until the NHS is up and running efficiently.

It may be a drop in the ocean, but why can't foreign health tourists be charged? When DH and I have had medical emergencies on holidays in Spain we have had our passports and E111/EHIC photocopied before receiving treatment. Now, we live and work in France and we have to pay €23 for a doctor appointment and full price for the drugs at the chemist. You pay a daily fee when admitted to hospital and a fee for the use of an ambulance. We now have the state health cards as we pay into their system and you get a partial rebate into your bank for the doctor fee and the drugs are at a reduced rate at the chemist.

When Brits use EU medical services, that country requests re-imbursement from the UK. In USA, no insurance-no treatment. I have heard that the NHS desk staff are too embarrassed to ask the foreign patients for money or insurance details. So then we aren't able to ask their country for a re-imbursement. The UK seems to be providing free medical services to the world, no wonder it is struggling to cope.

Of course when Brexit comes the NHS will be given an extra £350m a week.