The Invisible Hand

These huge hands have become very fashionable – seen most recently by me in Birmingham New Street station concealed for the most part behind the backs of rather embarrassed and giggling teenagers presumably there to give the newly arrived a clue in the chaos of the current works how to find their... 
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The white coat’s burden – healthcare colonialism

Colonialism is a mindset.  It governs how you see and behave unequally towards others. Few espouse the “white man’s burden” literally nowadays – and Kipling meant it ironically anyway, not as justifying a “noble enterprise”. But there is still a “colonial mentality”... 
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Would you recommend a trip to A&E?

Dan Wardle is our survey guru – who better to ask about the ‘recommend’ question now being put about in the NHS as a key measure of user satisfaction. We have in the past been fans of an approach that uses this question and now we need to know how it stands up under this latest glare... 
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Time to FaceTime the practice nurse

Roy Lilley nailed the problem in his usual way:  I think it is only a matter of time before the public starts to say; ‘Why do I have to queue on the phone to get an appointment with my GP?’ ‘Tell me why I have to have a day off to speak to someone I can talk to on Skype from my desk?’... 
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Habemus Epistola Pascha

Perhaps the time is overdue for the eminences of the national religion that is our NHS to retire into a conclave and finally decide who is in charge. We won’t be holding our breath for the white smoke – those of us left with functioning lungs. We will have staggered away – our walking... 
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Patients must stop being just “patients”

I agree with the NHS Alliance’s “Manifesto for Primary Care” when it says  that it is time “for a true primary care led NHS”.  Indeed it is and has been really since 1948.  But what their manifesto doesn’t seem to get is that sharing decisions with communities... 
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Too good to be true – says who?

Sainsbury’s has come up with the bright idea of offering GPs free premises in their stores or on their property.  Currently there are 27 such surgeries across the country and there are more to come.  The Man from Sainsbury’s has been asking people what they think of it so far: “Customers... 
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Moving engagement and governance on from Francis

This is our view about what the Francis Report should have said about patient and public involvement and governance, but didn’t.  Mr Francis could and should have gone further.   We support the general thrust of Francis, but we are concerned that what the report says about involvement/engagement... 
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notalwaysaande, get it?

On first glance, I certainly didn’t get it.  I thought notalwaysaande was a word in a foreign language I didn’t recognise. Sort of Dutch, kind of maybe?  But then I saw that it was part of a web address.  Staring at it harder, I eventually deconstructed it to read “not always A&E”... 
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Care plans or A&E – your choice

I had a revealing encounter with Sir David Nicholson this week in the grand surroundings of the Royal Society in SW1. National Voices hosted a smashing conference there on “patients as leaders: how people power will shape the new health and social care system”.  (@publicinvolve  reported... 
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