Current Affairs 2017 General Election

[peteblue]

Where do you pick up a prescription?

Do you want NHS staff cleaning hospitals?

Do you think the NHS invents new drugs?

Who do they buy their surgical equipment from?

I honestly cant see the problem.

Which is what used to happen.

Hence my insight.

This is the issue really Roydo. The health service in the U.K. has been a mixture of public and private supply for a long time. Even work done in hospitals is partly paid for by private health. The NHS has NEVER been able to operate without private company assistance. To imagine drug supply and equipment design and manufacture being undertaken by the NHS would condemn it to 3rd world standards. A great number of doctors and nurses in the NHS are privately employed and it's about time that our politicians told a bit of truth about how it really operates.......

 

[Bruce Wayne]

Where do you pick up a prescription?

Do you want NHS staff cleaning hospitals?

Do you think the NHS invents new drugs?

Who do they buy their surgical equipment from?

I honestly cant see the problem.

Which is what used to happen.

Hence my insight.

I'm seeing an awful lot of outside interest in healthcare at the moment. Of course, the cynic will regard that as being because they see so much opportunity to rip off patients or something, but given how bloody hard it is to get money out of the NHS (unless you've gone through the labyrinthine procurement system and are 'approved'), I'm significantly more inclined to think it's to do with the tremendous amount of opportunity to improve on what is a pretty dysfunctional way of doing things at the moment, especially in terms of technology.

And by outside interest, I'm not just talking about your human resources type folk (private hospitals) but many of the tech giants, a lot of the medical charities are doing some cool stuff, your industrial conglomerates (GE et al), robotics companies, a shed load of mobile and wearable companies. It's a fascinating time, and the NHS is having the mother of all problems handling the rate of new developments externally.

Speaking about some of this stuff in Barcelona next week if you fancied a bit of sunshine.

https://europe2017.health2con.com/

 

[Bruce Wayne]

As an example, Google are doing some incredibly interesting stuff at the moment via their Verily life science arm, which on one hand its great, but on the other hand it's Google and I can very well see the fact that it's Google and they crave our personal data stopping what they're doing properly scaling. The NHS should be leading the way on this approach to medical research as they could ensure its done properly and that patients can trust int he process, but they don't and fluff about umming and arring and time passes. They're an incredibly frustrating body to work with.

 

[JonS]

I'm seeing an awful lot of outside interest in healthcare at the moment. Of course, the cynic will regard that as being because they see so much opportunity to rip off patients or something, but given how bloody hard it is to get money out of the NHS (unless you've gone through the labyrinthine procurement system and are 'approved'), I'm significantly more inclined to think it's to do with the tremendous amount of opportunity to improve on what is a pretty dysfunctional way of doing things at the moment, especially in terms of technology.

And by outside interest, I'm not just talking about your human resources type folk (private hospitals) but many of the tech giants, a lot of the medical charities are doing some cool stuff, your industrial conglomerates (GE et al), robotics companies, a shed load of mobile and wearable companies. It's a fascinating time, and the NHS is having the mother of all problems handling the rate of new developments externally.

Speaking about some of this stuff in Barcelona next week if you fancied a bit of sunshine.

https://europe2017.health2con.com/

Is one of those people on the featured speakers you?

 

[Bruce Wayne]

Is one of those people on the featured speakers you?

Haha, I'm not that famous unfortunately I'm on a panel for a session about AI in healthcare.

 

[Tubey]

This is the issue really Roydo. The health service in the U.K. has been a mixture of public and private supply for a long time. Even work done in hospitals is partly paid for by private health. The NHS has NEVER been able to operate without private company assistance. To imagine drug supply and equipment design and manufacture being undertaken by the NHS would condemn it to 3rd world standards. A great number of doctors and nurses in the NHS are privately employed and it's about time that our politicians told a bit of truth about how it really operates.......

Baffling how this has a dislike, as there's quite literally nothing untrue in the entire post.

 

[Bruce Wayne]

Baffling how this has a dislike, as there's quite literally nothing untrue in the entire post.

The mod team are thinking of instigating a test members have to take before being allowed to rep.

 

[JonS]

Baffling how this has a dislike, as there's quite literally nothing untrue in the entire post.

Would be better if people countered a post if they disagreed with it rather than disliking

 

[orly]

The mod team are thinking of instigating a test members have to take before being allowed to rep.

*gets out revision notes

 

[orly]

Would be better if people countered a post if they disagreed with it rather than disliking

I agree John

Or better still, anonymous neg repping, with comments

 

[coollino]

I agree John

Or better still, anonymous neg repping, with comments

oh bbe that would be good.

 

[peteblue]

Would be better if people countered a post if they disagreed with it rather than disliking

Indeed....

 

[evilwebby]

That is a contradiction... Others "stepping into the arena" to help them spend less money on it = privatisation, surely? Also, who is this horse who speaks on behalf of all Tories?

It means a bigger private healthcare sector as an alternative to the NHS.. for those who can afford it. Economically this makes a lot of sense, as it would also alleviate some of the burden on the NHS, plus it also gives healthcare professionals another career path.
Like it or not, this is the way that healthcare will go down in the future. It is already very successful in delivering stuff like laser eye surgery and cosmetic surgery to more people, and at a ever lower cost.

 

[neil999]

ukip going in hard on islam, they are basically turning into the BNP now...that isnt gonna get them any new votes, i suspect they might cease to exist after this election

 

[Bruce Wayne]

It means a bigger private healthcare sector as an alternative to the NHS.. for those who can afford it. Economically this makes a lot of sense, as it would also alleviate some of the burden on the NHS, plus it also gives healthcare professionals another career path.
Like it or not, this is the way that healthcare will go down in the future. It is already very successful in delivering stuff like laser eye surgery and cosmetic surgery to more people, and at a ever lower cost.

The biggest area of growth will be in preventative services that aim to keep us well in the first place. The NHS has historically done this incredibly badly, and I just don't think they have the resources to develop such services today. The key will be to ensure the services we commission ourselves to do this effectively integrate with NHS services (especially from a data perspective).

For instance, at the moment there are a wide range of tools and services you can get to help you self-manage things like diabetes or mental health, but its rare for these services to synch with your medical records, so your GP is largely unaware of them.