NHS WASTE

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Patients’ confidential medical records are being placed on a controversial NHS database without their knowledge. Those who do not wish to have their details on the £11 billion computer system are supposed to be able to opt out by informing health authorities. But doctors have accused the Government of rushing the project through, meaning that patients have had their details uploaded to the database before they have had a chance to object. The scheme, one of the largest of its kind in the world, will eventually hold the private records of more than 50 million patients.

But it has been dogged by accusations that the private information held on it will not be safe from hackers. The British Medical Association claims that records have been placed on the system without patients’ knowledge or consent. It follows allegations that the Government wanted to complete the project before the Conservatives had a chance to cancel it. In a letter to ministers published today, the BMA urges the Government to suspend the scheme.

Hamish Meldrum, its chairman, writes, "The breakneck speed with which this programme is being implemented is of huge concern. Patients’ right to opt out is crucial, and it is extremely alarming that records are apparently being created without them being aware of it. If the process continues to be rushed, not only will the rights of patients be damaged, but the limited confidence of the public and the medical profession in NHS IT will be further eroded."

At present 1.29 million people have had their details placed on the system. A further 8.9 million records are due to be added by June. By the end of next year, the NHS hopes to have more than 50 million uploaded. The "summary" records contain basic medical information including illnesses, vaccination history, and could include medication patients have been given. Ages and addresses are also included. Patients are supposed to be notified by letter at least 12 weeks before their details go live on the system and given the chance to opt out.

The BMA says that letters have gone to the wrong addresses and that many patients have been unsure what they mean. Doctors point out that there has been no national advertising programme to explain the scheme, as has been the case with other government initiatives. The BMA also criticises the fact that the information packs do not include the form which allows patients to opt out. It can only be obtained via the internet or by calling a helpline.

Katherine Murphy, of the Patients Association, said, "The Health Service should not put in place bureaucratic obstacles to patient choice because they are worried about what patients might choose to do." Norman Lamb, the Lib Dem health spokesman, said, "The Government needs to end its obsession with massive central databases. The NHS IT scheme has been a disastrous waste of money and the national programme should be abandoned." (Source: Daily Telegraph, Mar/10)

Thousands of patients are being denied access to hospital consultants because the NHS has set up money-saving management schemes which block GPs' referrals. In direct contradiction to the government's claims to be encouraging more choice in healthcare, patients with rheumatoid arthritis, knee problems and eye and skin conditions are being targeted by managers who intercept referral letters and send them back to GPs or into physiotherapy clinics rather than allowing them to be seen by the appropriate specialist.

Administrators are using referral management schemes to curb hospital admissions and to cut waiting lists. The schemes start to operate once a GP sends an electronic letter to a hospital consultant, requesting an appointment for the patient. The letter is scanned by administrators who decide whether it constitutes an 'appropriate' referral. If they deem it unnecessary, the patient is 'bounced' back to a clinic within the primary care trust, or to a nurse manager or a physiotherapy clinic if it is an orthopaedic problem. (Source: Observer, Nov/06)

Heart surgeon Raj Mattu, who complained about "dangerous overcrowding", has been suspended on full pay for FOUR YEARS, costing the NHS more than £2million. Mr Mattu was suspended in 2002 after claiming patients on his ward were at risk of death due to tough Government-set treatment targets. He says a patient died on the cardiac ward of Walsgrave Hospital in Coventry because bays designed for four beds were occupied by five on the orders of management.

Instead of being praised for speaking out, hospital bosses ordered Dr Mattu off the premises and began legal action to sack him over claims of bullying. In 2005 a five-month inquiry found him not guilty of bullying and urged his immediate reinstatement. But, despite the huge bill, the hospital is still fighting for the right to sack him. He remains at home on his £90,000-a-year salary, officially Britain's longest-standing suspended doctor.

Mr Mattu spoke out in December 1999 when a 35-year-old patient on his ward died after suffering cardiac arrest. He claimed wall-mounted heart-starting machinery and suction tubes were too short to reach the man's bed, the fifth crammed into a bay designed for four. It has cost £1.4million for Mr Mattu's salary while suspended, a locum doctor and hospital lawyers and a further £1million was spent on the inquiry into the claims against him. (Source: Sunday Mirror, May/06)

UK patients forced to wait longer than they should for NHS treatment are entitled to reclaim the cost of being treated in Europe. The European Court of Justice said the NHS must refund costs if patients waited longer than clinicians advised, even if waiting time targets were met. The ruling will allow any patient facing an unacceptable delay who has the funds to pay for an operation upfront to seek treatment abroad and recoup the costs from the NHS.

The Department of Health said it did not expect the judgment to make a big difference to the numbers travelling abroad to receive hospital treatment. Also waiting time targets must be set "flexibly and dynamically" and reassessed if there is a deterioration in condition. As authorisation for reimbursements of costs was usually sought before treatment was obtained, the primary care trust would be the body to decide on whether the patient was facing an undue delay.

A Department of Health spokeswoman said, "We expect to continue with a system that requires any patient who wants to travel abroad for elective hospital treatment, paid for by the NHS, to be authorised to do this by their local healthcare commissioner before they receive treatment. However, we need to understand the full implications of the court's judgment before we make any changes to the systems operated by the NHS." (Source: BBC News, May/06)

Patients will be charged £5 a night to stay in hospital under plans for the NHS. The charge which would raise an annual £69million based on the 13,760,765 patients admitted to hospital in 2005. Other proposals include fees for IVF and other non-life saving treatments which are now free, fines for those who fail to turn up for GP and hospital out patients appointments and charges for drunks who cause a nuisance in A&E departments. (Source: Sunday People, May/06)

Lisa Rodrigues, the chief executive of the Sussex Partnership NHS Trust, has ordered 4,500 staff not to refer to people receiving medical care as "patients". Miss Rodrigues's decision to outlaw the dictionary definition of the word patient ("a person who is receiving medical care") might further confuse the Patient Advice and Liaison Service, which is a division of her own Sussex Partnership NHS Trust.

In a report to the trust's board entitled Language and Accessibility, Miss Rodrigues says, "People who are in our hospitals are patients. Otherwise, we refer to our clients as people who use our services." A spokesman for the trust, responsible for mental health, learning disability and addiction services for 1.5 million people, said the decision was made so that "clients" who are treated in the community would not feel stigmatised.

Miss Rodrigues has also ordered that Sussex should never be referred to as a single, geographical entity. "Sussex is an area of the South East of England comprising two counties, East and West Sussex, and one city, Brighton and Hove," she writes. "It has never been a single county and should not be referred to as such." But despite her ban on referring to Sussex as a single, geographic unit, she writes on the trust's website, "We know we have the support of the people of Sussex as we launch the new organisation." (Source: Daily Telegraph, Apr/06)

NHS bosses spent £15million relocating a casualty unit to a hospital nine miles away and 12 months later plan to move it back to where it was to save money. The new Accident and Emergency unit at Southport Hospital, Merseyside, was opened in 2005 but a team of management consultants, who have charged the NHS £560,000, has decided it should never have been built. They claim it's more cost-effective to shift the unit to sister hospital Ormskirk, where it was in the first place. Southport's Lib Dem MP John Pugh said, "To pay a bunch of accountants who know nothing about medicine a huge sum of money and in return to be told to move A&E away from the centre of population is barking mad." (Source: Sunday Mirror, Apr/06)

According to a survey by the Royal National Institute for the Blind (RNIB), some blind people are being forced to pay for their own white sticks. The sticks, vital equipment for most of the approximately 300,000 people in Britain registered as blind or partially sighted, should be supplied by councils' Social Services department. Yet more than three in ten people with severe vision problems have had to pay for their white sticks from their own pockets because local councils say they can't afford them. The law states that Social Services must provide the sticks and other essential aids under the Chronically Sick and Disabled Persons Act 1970 but councils claim underfunding by the government means they don't have the money. Southend Social Services spokeswoman Morag Cuthbertson said, "We do provide the blind with the necessary equipment and they should be getting the white sticks they need. The rehabilitation officer has recently retired and has not yet been replaced which may explain why the service is a little slow at the moment." (Source: Mail on Sunday)