NO ROOM FOR THE SICK?
I was reading that more than 30 patients have been turned away from Northern Ireland's cancer centre without receiving treatment. The City Hospital in Belfast has admitted that 34 patients awaiting chemotherapy had missed out on treatment since the start of April. It said this was because there was a shortage of overnight beds available for them. This is not good enough and is a tremendous indictment on NHS resource management. Cancer does not wait for beds to become available for treatment and I feel very sorry for those patients let down in this manner. My own father was too ill for any form of cancer treatment towards the end but the advance of the disease can be rapid and it must be a huge stress for the families involved to be told that the ward is full up.
David Vance
3 Comments
View Printer Friendly Version
Reader Comments (3)
It is the management i agree David.
"Cancer does not wait for beds to become available for treatment and I feel very sorry for those patients let down in this manner"
Im in the frustrating process of helping a close friend of the family who paid into the PRIVATE system for years.
She was admitted into A&E to an NHS hospital in East London after suffering a sudden blood clot on the brain.
She has paid a whacking huge monthly sum to ensure she was covered for everything privately but they are now REFUSING to take her!
We are trying to fight this but have heard from a friend who had the same issue with private insurance (and has since stopped paying into it), that we are wasting our time. From what i can see on the paperwork id agree. Who needs the stress of trying to sue them either etc etc when you are trying to care for this elderly woman in this state? She paid vast sums of money for a service she is now NOT getting.
The hospital is excellent and she is in the best hands for medical care - though we will need to figure out how to get her into a home eventually as short of a miracle she is not likley to improve.
But what a hideous rip off private is.
Everywhere you look throughout the NHS you will find a shortage of beds. The argument has been that with changes in treatment, day surgery and shorter stays there no longer is the need for the number of beds prviously required. All very good, but increasingly we hear that admissions have been cancelled, people have been referred to other distant hospitals, ambulances are queuing up outside A and E departments and patients are left on hospital trollies in corridors. All this is blamed on a shortage of beds.
This should not happen and I would suggest that the difference in the definition of effiency between accountants and the medical professions is one factor in this situation arising. To one, efficiency means a bed occupancy of around 98%. To the other efficiency means dealing with the medical requirements of a patient quickly and effectively. I leave it to you to determine which is which. I would, however, point out that health care requirements rise and fall and the lack of spare capacity smothers response.
Whilst I sympathise with the plight of cancer sufferers (I once worked in a Regional Oncology Centre) this problem of bed shortages (or a shortage of staff to support extra beds) is only going to be solved if we look again at what we are trying to do and how we do it. We need new thinking all round.
Might I suggest that the UK follows the Irish Republic's current policy and go with the idea of a national treatment purchase fund?
http://www.ntpf.ie/home/
If there isn't a bed free in the Republic they pay for a private hospital bed or fly them to the UK or mainland Europe and pay for one of theirs.
It seems to be working really well here.