We are watching the demise of the NHS with our eyes wide open.

FWIW I don't think clinicians are the best people to be in control of systems either. Often they are not good managers and there are too many egos and vested interests involved.

Casdon

The majority of drugs wasted in the NHS are as a result of patients in the community not taking their prescribed medication and failing to cancel their prescriptions, resulting in large stockpiles (which have often gone out of date before they are discovered). Only 7 days worth of medication is given on discharge from hospital, and they will dispose of any unwanted medications taken into hospital if a patients prescription changes. It’s a very complex area, but in the grand scheme of the NHS funding, it’s a drop in the ocean.
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If I hear that there are too many managers in the NHS and they are incompetent again I’m going to scream - most of them are clinicians running clinical services, and are hardworking, experienced people trying to keep a sinking ship afloat. Can’t people see that managers are the scapegoat for the under-resourced system not working effectively, not the cause of it. The Government and the media have to have somebody to blame and managers are the soft target in the NHS.

I resent your comments blaming patients etc for not taking the prescribed medicines and failing to cancel their prescriptions - if you are/are commenting on behalf of an NHS manager it just goes to show how little you/they actually know! The patients are not the ones prescribing the drugs are they! And they cannot have them on repeat prescription without it being signed off by a qualified medical professional!
When my husband was ill they kept swapping and changing his medication every weeks or two, but instead of prescribing a weeks or even 2 weeks worth of medication at a time they prescribed a couple of months worth, then it would change again before said medication even got a chance to be used!
And as for this cost being a "drop in the ocean", if this amount of waste is multiplied by the number of people in this country who have similar experiences, it would surely add up to the salaries of more medical staff costwise!
It would really interesting to know how many prescribed drugs are either lying unused in peoples homes or being returned to chemists. We'd probably have a drug mountain which 3rd world countries (or even our own NHS) would give their eye teeth for!

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