Local NHS Crisis

[mb1]

The media were full of reports yesterday about a massive financial crisis in the NHS due to underfunding over the years since 2010. This isn't just a national story. The Lister has a £6m deficit for the first quarter. The Princess Alexandra has a £9m deficit for the same period. Worse,it has very little cash in hand and is existing on emergency loan funding. This is traditionally the easiest quarter of the year for hospital finances, so the financial hole is going to get much bigger. The NHS needs at least 4% extra money per year to stay even. Since 2010 it has got nothing. Zero. In fact with inflation it has had a real terms cut. The Tories promised £8bn extra by 2020, but the NHS needs £3bn of that now! Locally, our Trusts are facing the consequences of this underfunding which means we are too.

[VicarageRoader]

Amazingly, the figures were released later than usual but this obviously had absolutely nothing to do with it being the Tory Party Conference at the time and there's no way Dave would have had those figures delayed.

[mb1]

Quite vicarageroader, quite!! i'm hoping that the mercury will take the trouble to do what took me half an hour and go look up these figures and report them. It's a big local story for us. We're serviced by two trusts. On would be in liquidation if it were a business, the other is not that badly off but has a big deficit nonetheless. There is no sense whatsoever that while the government and councils are insisting on building many more houses in the area that there is any more funding for necessary health services at all. Indeed, apparently the amount that the government will pay per surgery etc is actually being cut. Another massive drain on NHS funds is paying agency nurses to cover shifts, but five years ago the coalition cut nurse training places, so there is a shortage of nurses. at the same time, next year the Tories say they will start deporting people who have been here six years and who don;t earn £35k per annum. That will cut numbers of nurses even further. And what happens. We have longer waiting lists, less competent services. An A and E at Harlow that turned my son away after he collapsed at school because he wasn't dying! The last five years has turned a fairly healthy position in the NHS into an utter shambles, and locally that affects us badly.

[The Masked Woler]

Harlow is incredibly busy and a new larger hospital is desperately needed for the area, particularly when the thousands of new houses are built. The A & E is too small for the area it covers which includes Stanstead, the M11 and M25. I was talking to a paramedic last week who said they will often go to Cambridge instead.

However I have said before the using of the NHS as a political football is not helpful to the staff who get the short straw. patients (and families) go in expecting a poor service and take it out on those who least deserve it.

I was in Barnet A & E last week and they were doing their best but were simply being overwhelmed by the number of patients.

[JudieT]

There are also NHS Services that are being "outsourced" or transferred to the private sector with little or no consultation with staff or patients involved. This may show a short term benefit on the balance sheet, but is, IMHO, a very short-sighted policy which is upsetting a lot of people who trained for a vocational career within the NHS. Some even will have had their training funded by the NHS, but it seems they are now just a 'resource' to be counted only as a figure on a balance sheet. Their employment rights may be eroded and doubtless the service - i.e. the patients will suffer in the end.

[Scottman]

OK - we have a problem. The NHS is significantly underfunded and overstretched. Fact. The Scottfamily has specific knowledge and confirmation of the fact.

(i) What would you do about it?

(ii) If its about money, how much more would you give?

(iii) If its money, where does it come from?

I know of no public services that are confessing they have enough money. I know of none that have ever said they have enough funds. What exactly is the answer ?

(Retires behind sofa)

[VicarageRoader]

(iii) If its money, where does it come from?

How about the £32.4 billion a year that goes uncollected from the likes of Vodaphone, Google, Amazon etc ?

[Andy B]

(iii) If its money, where does it come from?

How about the £32.4 billion a year that goes uncollected from the likes of Vodaphone, Google, Amazon etc ?

Is giving the NHS an open cheque the answer? I'm not so sure it is, here in NZ there is not every facility in every hospital or even area so people are willing to travel to get that service so maybe there needs to some flexibility on both sides where certain hospitals specialise in some areas that patients from all over can go to.
Just a thought on other options!

[The Masked Woler]

You cannot fund an NHS as people would like, it simply isn't possible or financially sensible.
You have to fund on an average but there will be times when the service is over loaded.
PAH is busy and getting busier but I understand it's funding was reduced by £11M.

One problem is that many hospitals are simply not fit for purpose, they are too old and have grown haphazardly as bits are added on.

A new hospital would be ideal, designed and built for purpose, the old site could then be sold off to help fund it.

[Mancunian]

As i currently work for the NHS i can speak from the other side: this is not just a local issue and all trusts in the country have been told to make huge savings and this has caused major job losses which doesn't seem to get reported much on, at my trust there has been a blood bath when it comes to staff leaving as every department has been through evaluation and is still ongoing, i have seen colleagues of mine crying at their desks as they have been told their job has been deleted and then for them to go through the mire of being either redeployed elsewhere at a lower salary against their wishes or made redundant, i myself nearly lost my job but i'm now doing my old job plus 3 other peoples work which were my colleagues who have had to leave and was not nice, everything is cost save here, cost save there and as someone already has said outsourced, our IT dept is no longer here and is with a third party elsewhere in the country and various other departments are now looked after by third party bodies. just looking around people are on job websites looking for other jobs as it's an awful feeling of not knowing if you will have a job or not. What really gets my goat is that government saying economy is growing and pay is increasing etc when it clearly isn't, they need to realise that us staff here haven't had any pay increase as such for 5 years yet were told to do so much more without the bodies to do the work, the ICO, Monitor and other bodies who regulate us ask and recommend that we do this and that and we can't as we don't have the staff to do it due to cost cuts and it's basically a vicious circle, I'm not in acute but in Mental Health & community where it has been underfunded for years...