I watched a tv program the other day which highlighted that the NHS must make £billions of cuts in the next few years, it went on to say that childbirth costs approx £2000 but chemotherapy was extremely expensive (no figures given). I was surprised to hear on Friday when asking for the CA125 results to find it had not been analysed. The onc secretary asked why and was told that new guidelines were not to repeat CA tests within 20 days. This was news to her but requested it to be tested nonetheless, this was duly done and we got our results. It made me think that this process plus the recommendation not to apply chemo without symptoms is down to cost cutting in the NHS.
I wonder if decisions on our treatment are being driven by savings in the NHS. I hope not. Love to everyone Paul and Sandra xx
The NCEPOD recommendations do not fit in with the privatisation of the NHS, although Arvato have started with the DFT, it is to merge with the family sector. The NHS are next on the list, Arvato have sent out surveys already regarding patient care and their targets for reform, makes very worrying reading.
LA
If we are expensive we WILL be under scrutiny whenever they look at relative costs. I just wrote a second paper after researching how business intelligence will be used in the public sector and NHS trusts and hospitals are amongst the first to out it to work - delving and discovering hotspots of high cost and analysing this versus patient outcomes so they can focus spend better on delivering results which look good on league tables. Because League tables etc. are pretty blunt instruments when it comes to their focus, this is likely to be predicated on the basis that "better" will track with things like survival and long term benefit, and you can bet cancer doesn't stack up as well on that versus some other types of treatment. Now you have overlaid on top of it the inexperienced Clinical Commissioning bodies made up of GPs attempting to do the right things but who will undoubtedly make some spending mistakes and go down some expensive blind alleys while they learn... It doesn't exactly fill me with confidence.
I suspect this will be the first of many stories to emerge with connotations for us all. We should start using NHSReforms tag maybe so we can use the info to gather evidence for lobbying our MPs ...... We need to record how it affects our own individual stories so that these can be used to maybe defer or re-direct further cutbacks.
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update on complete cock up by nhs!
Which NHS Trust - What Treatment?
nhs voucher for wig?
CHRISTIE NHS Waiting times
