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Last week saw the publication of a series of reports on the role of the Department of Health and the management of the new NHS (see p 357).(1) These reports [...]

The last elements of the restructuring of the National Health Service in Britain were put in place last week with the publication of details of how the NHS Executive and [...]

Labour throws its new health plans open to debate The publication of Health 2000,[1] the Labour party's document on health and health services in Britain, indicates the outlines of an […]

In February 1990, the late David Widgery and I wrote a response for NSS to the glossily-produced white paper on health, misleadingly entitled, 'Working for patients'. We added a question [...]

There is a curious division of opinion about the National Health Service reforms introduced by the government in 1991. If asked, most members of the public would describe them as [...]

The NHS reforms are 'causing widespread disaffection among those who deliver the service,' warned Dr Jeremy Lee-Potter, the chairman of the BMA's council, at the start of the BMA's annual [...]

More substantial changes on the way The future direction of the NHS reforms is currently under scrutiny by a review team established by Virginia Bottomley. The decision to appoint the [...]

FEW Tory ministers of health are wholly at ease. The National Health Service (NHS) was, after all, created by a Labour Party hero, Nye Bevan. Its 1m-strong staff belong to [...]

Three and a half years ago I described my experience of a meeting I attended for briefing on the brave new world of budget holding, the wild card of the [...]

If people have better ideas they must justify them with reasoned argument Sir Bernard Tomlinson and his team have produced a cogent, well argued report (p 1045).[1 2] If implemented [...]

To pursue its aim of making health authorities 'champions of the people,' the NHS Management Executive earlier this year issued guidance for purchasing authorities on gathering and using the views [...]

New Labour health reforms risk failure: Government plans for modernising the NHS are at risk of failing because of the constant changes to the NHS structure and the highly centralised [...]

The government wants the hospitals and primary care trusts that perform the best to gain foundation status and thereby win greater freedom from Whitehall. Will this development liberate a new [...]

The health secretary, Alan Milburn, last week defended the government's plans to increase private sector involvement in the health service. Speaking to the government's health select committee, Mr Milburn said [...]

Amid all the debates that have raged over the past couple of decades about how to make the health service more efficient, one thing has always seemed clear: that the [...]

The aims of the Commission for Health Improvement and the functions of its review managers are discussed. The benefits of conducting reviews of health service organisations and qualities required of review managers are explored.

This is the first of four articles showing how primary care groups have been set up in various areas in Britain Summary points The introduction of primary care groups from [...]

NO MATTER how much extra money is pumped into the National Health Service, it seems that the public's demand for treatments always outstrips supply. Despite the K20 billion of extra [...]

The structural framework on which the government plans to rebuild the NHS in England was set out in a bill introduced in parliament last week. It reforms the system of [...]

The new white paper will set the health service up for the next 50 years One of the main reasons people elected a new Labour government on 1 May was [...]

CONTINUING the long and ignoble tradition for recently elected governments to blame every problem on their predecessors, Frank Dobson, the health secretary, claimed this week that serious shortcomings in cancer-screening [...]

Care in the community has not been successful in all areas, and two thirds of mental health expenditure in England and Wales is still going to hospital-based services. There needs to be further money invested in community care services and the Association of Directors of Social Services' mental health strategy group is to look at whether there are sufficient mental health services in place before the closure of long-stay hospitals.

The new UK Secretary of State for Health faces a difficult task. The new Labour government has moved on the more obvious issues in the health service in its first weeks in office, but the Prime Minister has indicated that he wants major reforms in the service. This may prove difficult in a health service which is under financial pressure and lacking vision, especially as the government has promised to adhere to the tight budgets planned for its first and successive year of office.

MOST people in Britain think that the National Health Service is on its knees. This view goes far to explain the Tories' unpopularity: the NHS is the part of the [...]

Why is Labour going to scrap an innovation that is popular and effective? By April 1997 more than 58 per cent of GPs will be fundholders. Most of them were [...]

The UK government's new White Paper, entitled 'A Service with Ambitions,' sets down five strategic aims for healthcare. These involve making the NHS more responsive to patient needs, giving it greater cohesion, keeping the public informed, using evidence-based practice and creating a skilled workforce. A key element of the document will be a review of education and training, thus working towards improving quality of staff and treatments.

Someone at Berkshire Health Commission has a warped sense of humour. Maidenhead town hall was a curiously inappropriate place to hold a public meeting about its plan to save 3.5£ [...]

Pharmacy standards in Lincolnshire, England, have been developed by pharmacists themselves following discussions with Lincolnshire Health. The Community Pharmacy group has been involved in talks on nursing homes and payment for services outside working hours. Some 70% of family physicians in Lincolnshire control their own funds but this arrangement could be changed if a Labor Party government is elected. Devolution of cash to localities has been carried out in Finland and this is a useful model for the UK.