Yesterday’s Health Select Committee report makes an important case against the Government’s NHS reforms. It argued that the reform programme has and will act as a diversion from the main task of improving value for money for the health service. Read the rest of this entry »
The BMA’s legendary political consistency strikes again
Filed Under (BMA, Clinical Commissioning Groups, Primary Care Trusts) by Paul on 05-01-2012
Before Christmas I wrote a post that called into question the depth of the BMA’s love for current PCT staff. I pointed out that in their latest guidance they were extolling the virtues of current PCT staff to BMA members leading clinical commissioning groups as being the best experts in commissioning. I suggested that they were doing this because in the last couple of years they have become fearful of new private sector firms selling their services to GP led commission groups. Read the rest of this entry »
Medical and resource decisions. Should GPs make them both?
Filed Under (Clinical Commissioning Groups, GP Commissioning, Primary Care Trusts) by Paul on 09-11-2011
(These new forms of media can be very difficult. Blog readers will probably know that I tweet to let people know there is a new post on the blog. But I am not sure whether blog readers follow me on Twitter. I assume that some of you just read the post and are not in the Twittersphere.
Yesterday I posted about the very difficult relationship between the autonomy of GPs in CCGs to make commissioning decisions for their locality, and the National Commissioning Boards central control of those decisions. Following that there was a fascinating flurry of activity about the problem – or not – of GPs making referral decisions about their patients and how those decisions will relate to the financial decisions they will have to make as commissioners.)
This question is not only at the heart of the current Government reforms but is also at the heart of the debate about the vision of professional responsibility within the NHS. Read the rest of this entry »
Remind me again, why is the Secretary of State abolishing PCTs?
Filed Under (Clinical Commissioning Groups, Primary Care Trusts, Secretary of State) by Paul on 07-11-2011
Last week I spoke at the National Association of Primary Care Conference and was interested to hear the Secretary of State. As I shall explain tomorrow it was good to hear him articulate a narrative explaining why his reforms were important to an audience of future leaders of Clinical Commissioning Groups. (Even if that narrative failed to encompass the real life experiences of creating CCGs that those in the room expressed to him). Read the rest of this entry »
Why should the NHS maintain a monopoly position allowing only existing GP organisations to compete for patients?
Filed Under (Competition, GPs, Primary Care Trusts, Third party provision) by Paul on 11-05-2011
By all accounts Dr Clare Gerada, from the RCGP, is not just a good medical politician but also a first class GP. And one the good things about the reforms in GP services up until now is that very good doctors have been able to provide good services for more patients because they have won tenders to provide those services. The tendering process has ensured that the commissioners of NHS care have the opportunity to get the best services for their local people and it is through competition that this has been achieved. Read the rest of this entry »
PCT staff fired on Friday rehired …when?
Filed Under (Coalition Government, Health and Social Care Bill, Primary Care Trusts) by Paul on 06-04-2011
Following my post last week on the possible resurrection of PCTs to act as a safety net for those parts of the country that will not have organised GP Commissioning Consortia in April 2013 there has been an interesting juxtaposition in London. Read the rest of this entry »
As I said in my blog on July 26th “Liberation through conscription will not work.” Making GPs do something that they don’t want to is and was a recipe for disaster. Since there are some GPs who are , in the current Secretary of State’s words, ’enthusiastic’ about commissioning working with them will move the policy forward. Making those who don’t want to commission was daft then and is daft now. Read the rest of this entry »
Patient choice and the NHS – the debate goes public
Filed Under (BBC, Health Policy, Primary Care Trusts) by Paul on 29-03-2011
The BBC has just launched its own analysis on Radio 4’s Today programme examining NHS progress toward the development of competition. Nick Triggle’s report also appeared on the BBC’s website. Read the rest of this entry »
The centralisation of NHS power as a method of liberating the NHS
Filed Under (GP Commissioning, GRIP, Primary Care Trusts, Reform of the NHS) by Paul on 22-03-2011
More analysis of the dual power system that has been set up within the NHS. Read the rest of this entry »
GRIP 2 – More on the New Liberation Theology of the NHS
Filed Under (Foundation Trusts, GP Commissioning, GRIP, Health Policy, Primary Care Trusts, Reform of the NHS) by Paul on 11-02-2011
The story so far…
Last December the Government decided to support two opposing models of policy implementation for the NHS.
The first is for the medium term. It is the policy of liberating the NHS from the power of traditional NHS bosses and developing the different market mechanisms that they feel will bring greater efficiency. Read the rest of this entry »
