HSJ Health Check

A tale of three regions – what happened next? After the first covid wave we took a deep dive into three regions in England – now as the third wave ebbs away we have returned once more. We ask, how did things pan out for them over the rest of last year? And what are the main challenges the health systems will be grappling with over the coming months? Featuring Rebecca Thomas, Jack Serle, Lawrence D...

Boris Johnson has appointed a new health adviser, well known to NHS health policy circles. Samantha Jones – former NHS England director and hospital chief – is to leave the private sector and move into the civil service. We discuss what this could mean for the NHS and whether this is a precursor to an even bigger job. Along with this we cover more significant people moves in the health service thi...

The NHS has been given its planning guidance for the first half of this year 2020-21 – and it strikes a markedly different tone to previous years. But what else would you expect from 2021? We break down why it is more about systems than trusts, why activity rather than output is king, and provide some more insight on what its means for the NHS’s finances and workforce. We also discuss NHS England’...

For the first time ever the leader of a mental health trust has been named HSJ’s top chief executive for 2021, and in a surprising turn of events, three former top-table leaders have fallen out of the top 50 altogether. Why their fall from grace? And was it an act of utter hubris or just plain posturing? We discuss the health secretary’s suggestion the new NHS bill would give him the power to veto...

This week has seen the publication of not one but two huge sets of data – the biggest workforce survey in the world and the latest NHS performance stats – and we’ve crunched them both. We go beyond the headlines and discuss the mixed picture presented in the NHS staff survey data – it might come as a surprise that more staff are recommending their place of work despite being in the middle of a pan...

In a last minute controversial intervention Matt Hancock has torpedoed plans in Lancashire to consolidate emergency services. This has frustrated local NHS leaders and could potentially stifle future planning and innovation. And raises the question, is he even allowed to do this in the first place? Plans are also being worked up this spring to get the spiralling elective waiting list under control...

Reasonable or “unnecessarily hostile”? This week’s HSJ Health Check debates whether its right for a trust to threaten its staff with disciplinary or regulatory action if they try and have their second covid jab early. University Hospitals Birmingham FT sent an email to its workforce doing just this. Could this have been communicated better? We also discuss whether mandatory vaccination could be on...

One of the pandemic’s apparent success stories has been  the development and operation of an NHS covid-19 data store. Holding  information on everything from ventilators to vaccinations, the data  store has driven the NHS and government’s decision-making throughout. However,  privacy campaigners have raised concerns about the way in which  sensitive NHS data could be used...

HSJ revealed this week NHSX – the tech agency set up by Matt Hancock not quite two-years ago – is set to merge with NHS England. We ask what this says about the government’s tech ambitions, who could be parachuted in to lead the new directorate and why a separate agency was created in the first place. We also cover the surprising news almost 2 million people have been added to the shielding list a...

This week the team analyses what government’s new health plan – the most significant reform of the NHS in nearly a decade – really means. While giving integrated care systems a statutory footing and axing the NHS tender process, if passed the proposals would give the health secretary far-reaching powers over NHS England, other arm's length bodies and local reconfigurations. Featuring Sharon Brenna...

This week the team discuss two major stories, unrelated, but both in the Midlands. We discuss Rebecca Thomas’ investigation into “heartbreaking” patient safety incidents in University Hospitals Birmingham FT’s haematology services. This was prompted by more whistleblowers than ever before making contact with her. We also cover University Hospitals of Leicester’s “unprecedented” financial breakdown...

“Resilience requires buffer and buffer can look wasteful until the moment that it isn’t,” Simon Stevens told MPs at a committee hearing in parliament this week. We discuss how the pandemic made the NHS’ approach to running everything to optimum, just-in-time efficiency fall apart. We also talk about NHS England’s decision to start collecting race and ethnicity date when giving the covid vacation s...

Operational pressures on the NHS because of covid are still high, and although admissions are starting to level off in some places, the usual winter challenge of patient discharge is more troubling than ever. This week Sharon Brennan, Nick Carding, Annabelle Collins and Dave West reflect on the barriers to covid patient discharge, why funding from the Treasury is too little, too late and why domic...

Hospitals in the Midlands are being primed to take covid patients from London and the South East, but with the tidal wave of covid admissions sweeping north this seems like a very short term fix. This week on the podcast the team track how admissions are changing throughout the country, with numbers starting to dip in London for the second day in a row. Things are looking less promising in other r...

Amid the covid chaos and ever- climbing cases in England this week, the team try and dissect what’s going on. Our expert journalists discuss what is really means for the NHS to be “overwhelmed”, how the latest surge is affecting intensive care provision and the workforce and whether it’s time to return to the national emergency management approach to keeping the health service on its feet. There i...

Four HSJ correspondents make their predictions for the NHS in 2021, from the vaccination programme and more reorganisation, through to change at the top, staffing and mental health. Annabelle Collins, Dave West, Nick Carding and Rebecca Thomas also look back at how our 2020 forecasts panned out. Which was not too terrible, despite the cataclysmic impact of the coronavirus pandemic.

This week has seen the first doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine administered in the UK, but the continuing covid pressures on the NHS remain, with concerns raised about the health service being overwhelmed in coming weeks and months. We explore what impact this would have on care provided and what is being done to mitigate it. The vaccine programme rumbles on and we discuss the roll out in prima...

The UK is the first country in the western World to approve the Pfizer/BioNTech covid vaccine and now the baton has been passed to the NHS to successfully deliver it.    This week on the podcast we unpick this huge piece of news and discuss the incredibly complicated logistics behind rolling out a vaccination programme this big, why its essential the government gets the communication spo...

This week has seen a flood of coronavirus related news so the podcast this week discusses two other important happenings, that might have been given more attention in normal times. First up, we analyse what the Chancellor’s spending review means for the NHS and the day-to-day running of hospitals, the thorny issue of staff pay and an unfulfilled promise on social care. We also discuss the latest d...

With delays to promised long-covid support clinics, warnings from the former health secretary and unions about protecting staff pay, and trusts accused of penalising staff during their recovery - we dig into why its crucial the NHS provides adequate support sooner rather than later for this debilitating condition. We also discuss the enhanced role for the Care Quality Commission over hospital food...

On the podcast this week the team dig into how the NHS is already mobilising to deliver a covid vaccine and some of the hurdles it could face in this enormous task. The stakes are high for the health service and the nation: Eminent vaccine guru Sir John Bell this week said vaccines could get life back to normal by spring – provided the delivery is not “screwed up”. We also ask if the Test and Trac...

Recorded in the middle of another dramatic week for the NHS, the latest HSJ Health Check takes stock of whether primary care really has seen long-lasting innovation during the pandemic, and debates if a mood-measuring watch for GPs is the answer to burn-out. We also discuss progress towards the “40 new hospitals” (or thereabouts), and the long-running saga of Chorley emergency department which a l...

“Acute trust boards did not always see mental health care as an integral part of patient care”, said the CQC in a new report on mental health that could have easily gone under the radar. We hear from senior correspondent Rebecca Thomas on why this report matters, if true integration between mental health and acute care are some way off, how the pandemic has further damaged this and whether leaving...

On the podcast this week we try to get to the bottom of the political furore and ensuing confusion engulfing the North West, including a lesson on just how long it takes to heat up Manchester’s Nightingale Hospital. We also discuss what impact the continued rise in covid-19 admissions could have on non-covid NHS work, and look at new data which shows an unusually high number of excess deaths at ho...

As covid wave two crashes onto the NHS in the north of England, HSJ Health Check discusses the last minute scrambles to try to protect elective care, and mass-test staff. While covid-19’s second wave appears a little less destructive than the first, it is bringing steeply rising admissions in the areas most affected --- and sparking a somewhat chaotic reaction as health systems try to prepare for...