HSJ Health Check

On the podcast this week we look ahead to winter and ask whether NHS England’s ten-point A&E action plan could prevent a crisis. We also discuss important changes to infection control guidance and whether this could make a difference to the ever-growing elective backlog.

On this week’s podcast, we discuss the knock-on impact covid has had on staffing and services, after medical consultants at a major acute trust warned its leadership that specialist staff shortages are causing services to become unsafe. Also, Greater Manchester’s coroner’s office has opened an unusually high number of inquests into patient deaths — higher than all the other coroners in Yorkshire,...

The government has announced £15.6bn extra funding for the NHS — but NHS England is having to curb its ‘long-term plan’ ambitions and considering which of its budgets to shave. This week’s HSJ Health Check podcast explores why. We also cover how NHS England’s commitment to publish core performance data broken down to identify health inequalities, among other “urgent actions” to tackle inequalities...

This week’s HSJ Health Check podcast discusses the warnings made by a Greater Manchester coroner over the risks of remote GP appointments, following the deaths of five people. Is it fair to blame general practice for the safety concerns? We also talked about the government’s big health and care funding announcement and what it means for the NHS. Featuring Lawrence Dunhill, Jasmine Rapson and Rebec...

This week’s HSJ Health Check podcast discusses the government comms “playbook” which, as revealed by HSJ, told trusts they should describe new wings, units and refurbishments as “new hospitals” — which they are not. We also talk about NHS England’s framework contract for salary advance schemes for NHS staff, similar to the proposal from now-collapsed Earnd. Featuring Ben Clover, Annabelle Collins...

With seven months to go we discuss what ICSs have to do before they become statute on 1 April, amid brewing rows over who might sit on the board. We also discuss mental health provider collaboratives, which will soon be taking on budgets and ask: what can ICSs learn from them? And with yet more news of private providers being rated inadequate, we ask who is keeping a grip on care quality. Featurin...

An HSJ investigation revealed this week that coroners have raised multiple concerns pandemic hospital visiting restrictions may have had a damaging effect on patient care. We discuss how vulnerable patients have been adversely affected by these covid rules and how trusts are still having to balance patient visiting with reducing the spread of covid. Also this episode- trust leaders have spoken of...

Waits in NHS accident and emergency departments have risen to an all-time high, according to the latest national data, while there has been a surge in the number of people calling ambulances for the most serious types of incidents. We try and unpick why the health service is under such extreme pressure in the middle of summer. Also the ongoing international blood collection tube shortage rumbles o...

This week’s NHS Health Check podcast is dedicated to all matters staffing. We discuss the implications of the pay review and where the NHS will find the money to fund it since the government said it must come from the NHS’s own budgets; who should be paid more, chief executives of trusts or integrated care systems; and why shielding NHS staff were not given risk assessments before they returned to...

In a leaked letter obtained by HSJ the government has told eight of the most advanced ‘40 new hospitals’ trusts to put together cheaper plans for their new buildings. Trusts are scrambling to get their new plans in by Monday and we dissect what impact this could have on the future of these crucial rebuilding schemes. We also discuss the recent announcement of 25 permanent chairs for the new integr...

The sharp increase in shared NHS trust chairs and CEOs has been notable in recent months, with more key appointments made in London and the North West just this week. We discuss why the appointment of joint chairs matters, how boards cope when overseeing more organisations and what this means for the integration agenda. Also, this week NHS England has sent a striking letter to trusts in the Midlan...

Trusts received an unpleasant surprise last Friday when they were told they must do more elective procedures to receive money from the national £1bn ‘elective recovery fund’. The demand for more activity comes with pressure on providers rising as covid levels soar. We discuss how local systems feel the move has left their elective recovery plans in tatters and the politics behind the row. Also, tr...

The NHS Health Bill has finally been published. We discuss the most eye-catching measures and the controversies surrounding what was supposed to be straight-forward legislation. We also look into what it all means for integrated care systems and why a lot still needs to be thrashed out if the bill is to be enshrined in law by April 2022 as planned. And we update listeners on what is proving to be...

With a new health secretary appointed days before the Health Bill was due to be published, we discuss what’s next for the legislation. We analyse the impact on the NHS if Sajid Javid decides to delay, amend or go ahead with it as it is, and why so much about the new health secretary’s modus operandi is still unknown. Featuring Sharon Brennan, Alastair McLellan and Annabelle Collins.

Harnessing an opportunity to use the ‘full power of data’ to improve patient care, or a worrying ‘data grab’? The government has published its draft data strategy and we discuss what this could mean for transparency, care quality and how it links to the ongoing GP record-sharing debacle. Also, the latest and most significant integrated care system legislation updates, including more on the ICS des...

Monday marked the deadline for applicants wanting to be the next NHS England CEO to throw their hat in the ring. In this podcast HSJ editor Alastair McLellan talks to the former health secretary and current chair of Commons Health and Social Care committee about how the most powerful person in the NHS will be chosen.

Dr Waheed Arian escaped from Afghanistan and came to the UK as a child refugee in 1999. Since then, he has become an A&E doctor and founded global telemedicine charity ‘Arian Teleheal’. In this episode Annabelle Collins is joined by Dr Arian, who discusses why simplicity was key when it came to launching a successful telemedicine charity, how his formative experiences in Afghanistan inspired i...

Under the cover of Cummings’ headline-grabbing testimony last week, NHS England gave plans to scrap the landmark 4-hour A&E target the greenlight. We discuss how the ‘ten metrics’ intended to replace it could work in practice. Will they result in safer patient care or be too unwieldy to work in reality? Also this week – NHS chief executive Yvonne Ormston has written powerfully about her experi...

With Cumming’s setting the health select committee on fire, serious allegations were raised about Matt Hancock’s handling of the pandemic. In this week’s podcast we investigate what the biggest allegations were, what new information was revealed and what it really means for the health secretary’s career. Featuring Sharon Brennan, Lawrence Dunhill and Nick Carding.

HSJ revealed in an investigation this week that serious concerns were raised by patients at a mental health hospital for children in the years before it was rated ‘inadequate’ by the national regulator in March 2021. We ask why it took so long for action to be taken and whether there is an enduring problem with care quality at private mental health hospitals? We also shine the spotlight on autism...

In this week’s podcast we discuss how the government’s health and social care legislation plans are changing — both in substance and in context. That includes government concessions on some crucial legal details, ministers’ new priorities for the service, getting to grips with implementation, and what the change in NHS England’s chief executive might mean. Featuring Sharon Brennan, Dave West and A...

Sir Simon Stevens will step down from running the NHS at the end of July, and so the countdown begins; 12 weeks to find a successor. This week Alastair, Dave and Annabelle discuss the recruitment process, who’s involved and why we could end up with an interim instead. We discuss the front-runners in more detail and whether someone with a narrower, more operational focus than Sir Simon might be the...

The NHS – and in indeed the World – has been watching the catastrophic covid surge in India, with almost 400,000 cases recorded in a single day. This week we are joined by a member of our India office who describes the impact this has had on her family and how “disease and death has become so much a part of the everyday conversation”. We hear how social media has become an important tool for famil...

At the start of the pandemic, financial services company Greensill launched ‘Earnd’, an advanced payment system, for NHS staff. Some trusts signed up for it and it was given backing from senior figures in the health service. A year later, both have gone bust, former PM David Cameron is implicated in a lobbying scandal involving Greensill and serious questions are being asked about what exactly hap...

Eating disorder services in the NHS are at crisis point, with lockdown making an already pressurised situation even worse. With both adults’ and children’s admissions rocketing, the number of specialist beds has not kept pace, leaving patients stranded without the care they need on general medical wards. This week we are joined by two experts in this field who warn unless leaders and managers trea...