A PETITION and campaign has been started in Hedon to oppose changes to NHS funding agreements which a local town councillor argues will affect rural general practice services with some possibly being forced to close down in this area.
The changes follow the government’s decision to phase out the MPIG (minimum practice income guarantee). According to the BMA (British Medical Association) the withdrawal of MPIG will see some practices lose a third of their total NHS income over the phase-out period, with “at least 98 practices” being affected by the changes.
Sarah Rommell, a local health campaigner who also happens to be a Hedon Town Councillor, has launched a petition to object to the planned changes. She has made a copy of the petition available to download and print off, she asks that people attempt to get completed petitions returned to her by Monday 24th March 2014.
Download Petition (PDF): Patients Against Government Cuts to Rural GP Funding
For full story see HU12 Online…..
The BBC reports on “threat of extinction” to GP services: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-26703519
Maybe it’s time local parish/town councils had a say in some aspects of their local NHS services.
In my opinion bad practices by NHS hospital management over the years have cost us dearly. One small example being the ruling that patients had to be seen within specified deadlines, these deadlines being impossible, thus patients were passed for unnecessary referrals to other hospital consultants in order to remove their names before the time deadline; eventually patients would be referred back to their original consultant. Each unnecessary consultation costing the taxpayers a lot of money and additionally poor treatment has led to patients and their families being financially compensated.
Another shocking costly example is the Private Financial Initiative (PFI) viz:
While the capital cost of rebuilding Calderdale Royal Hospital in Yorkshire is £64.6m, the scheme will end up costing Calderdale and Huddersfield NHS Foundation Trust a total of £773.2m. Similarly, the cost of building the new Walsgrave district general hospital in Coventry will jump from an initial £379m to an eventual £4bn.
Parish and town councils “having a say” – God forbid we’d ever let Hedon Town Council run our local health services !
HAHA or the Labour Party , who are doing such a fine job in Wales !!
I once heard a GP in rural Wales saying that when he arrived he had had no experience of the local ailments and he’d had to learn as he went along. Goodness knows how many of his patients suffered due to his lack of knowledge. This could well be the case for many farmers and villagers in the East Riding if their local surgeries are closed due to lack of funding. I have a comparison anecdote regarding the knowledge of local GP’s and town surgeries, including hospitals, which often use migrating medical staff. A cousin of mine in Hull had a problem with his foot and was referred to the hospital, after several appointments with various departments over several months it was discovered he had gangrene from which he subsequently died, in great pain, a year later. Roll back several years and I visited Dr. Gamble in his Hedon surgery. He immediately informed me; “You have gangrene in your leg, come back after surgery on Thursday and I’ll operate.”. One tourniquet and half an hour later I left the rancid flesh in his surgery and was on my way home with a bite sized chunk taken out of my ankle knowing that I wouldn’t win the neatest ankle competition again. It had all gone painlessly smoothly excepting I’d had pins & needles in my foot and I’d learnt he had a foible when he said; “Please lay down, I can’t work with you watching me”.
I would like to add my support to the petition it is of my opinion that closing GP practices as let us face it is the ultimate idea behind cuts, they cut back then cut back some more until there’s no funding left, but who does this hurt not the well off, it hurts the poorer people, and all too often higher government ideas always seem to me to benefit only the well off and not the working classes, but guess what people! illness can befall us all no mater what its the nature of humanity to have illnesses from time to time, so don’t fall for these cut backs and sign against them, because once you lose your doctors there is no getting them back, don’t let us become just more sheeple our country is already heading that way, stand up for what is right not what some Tory minister thinks, think of it this way if your too ill to go out because say you contracted flu and the doctors close how do you expect to get any help or are we meant to go back to pre Victorian times.
That doesn’t say much to me at all …i still state ..i dont think these cuts will effect us . and cant see anything in this article that states anything different.. This is one view from one Dr and as i said in my original comment i do think people tend to panic and not listen as to exactly how these things will work , people dont like change, however in a world were people are living longer and longer anyone who thinks we can carry on throwing money at the NHS as has been done for years is crazy , we simply dont have the money, not only that dont you want us to have a health service that will compete with the rest of europe with regards to levels of service and most of all patient survival. I dont have all the answers but to just ignore the situation is ridiculous.
The cuts will directly effect you and everyone living in a rural practice area, the service level will fall either by cutting of surgery staff or reducing patient care. Worst case scenario is the practice will close, probebly not the two in Hedon but others in the surrounding area could well be effected.
It has been stated in the East Riding of Yorkshire Parish Transport Toolkit that approximately one in five households in the area do not have a car. How would they be expected to get access to a GP should it have to be closed due to the withdrawel of MPIG funding?
Another potential problem is that of over stretching of already thinly spread resources. It has all too often been stated that Hedon’s resources are stretched to the max, what would happen if rural services out of Hedon close and then Hedons GP surgeries take on the patients? It can be bad enough to get an appointment now let alone with another few thousand patients on a practice register.
From slightly more political angle the ConDems stated that NHS funding would be ring fenced (ie not subject to austerity cuts). This is all fine dandy but what has not happened is an increase in budget to reflect inflation and rising costs (there has been a small increse but not enough to cover the cost rises), this directly results in a cut to funding available.
No more money is in the pot therefore they are shuffling finances around to pay for hare brained scemes that will not work.
Removal of vital GP practices in rural areas is not the answer. This will just cause more problems for rural patients and an already stretched NHS.
Even the government has paused its flagship “Health and Social Care Bill” because of widespread criticism.
Yes people are living longer, claiming thier pensions and needing more help. The fact is that they paid into the system and deserve to get what they need out of it despite the current governments draconian austerity measures.
The GP in question, Dr Green of Hedon Group Practice, is a local area representative of the GMC (General Medical Council), If he and indeed they are concerned then surely their patients should be?
I agree the situation within the NHS should not be ignored, but this is not the route to go down, it has potentially disastrous implications for anyone living in a rural area.
In your opinion, i would like to hear from the other side before i decide. I am currently under the NHS for an ongoing health care issue . and have witnessed first hand the mismanagement which results in thousands of pounds wasted , as i said before im not saying i have the answers but objecting to every change is not in my opinion the right way forward at least lets listen to the alternatives.
Neil, yes that is my opinion. It is based on the information available. Having talked to numerous GPs surgeries, doctors, consultants and auxiliary medical staff about this situation they all agree that it is a backward step.
Many of my family rely on NHS services as it seems you do. I also have family and friends who work in the NHS. I have witnessed the effects of understaffing, outdated faulty equipment resulting is misdiagnosis and I have been told that the cuts are directly responsible for these, not mismanagement. Out of interest what mismanagement have you witnessed?
Looking at it there are no alternatives offered, just cuts.
Well Put Jason. I fully agree with you. I personally don’t think Neil is in touch with reality on this one. Cutbacks always seem to head in one direction, that being stripping away the bit of help people get, and we have a very long way to get behind the rest of Europe seeing as we are one of the leading places for a good health authority. Also notable is the number of people coming every year to our country to make use of our health services.
Now I wonder which political party excepted that one? What about what the people want, and not Tory Leaders?
slightly going off topic Peter?, but you understand as members of the European union we have no choice in who can and cant use our health service, Any resident of the European union who is in our country has every right to use the NHS Membership of the European union is supported by all the major parties , also i beg to differ on your last statement , we lag well behind countries of a similar economic size Sweden for one .i can go on if you want me to.. People want a health service that works for today not one that is based on a plan written in the 40s and 50s. Change is needed.
Neil, I think the point Peter was trying make is that people flock from all around the European Union to get treatment in the UK so our health service can’t be that bad. Regarding the history of our entry into the EU, the UK first tried to join the EU or EEU as it known at the time in 1961 under a Conservative government led by Harold Macmillan, our entry was vetoed at the time by Charles De Gaulle, the French President. Fast forward to 1973 when our application to join the EU was accepted and it was again under another Conservative government this time led by Ted Heath. So the EU rules that we abide by now were actually instigated by the Conservative party. So whilst successive governments have kept our country in the EU it is in reality the Conservatives who put us in the situation of anyone from the EU residing or visiting the UK to be able to use the NHS.
Regarding Sweden having better healthcare, well that is as maybe but if you look at the demographics of the respective countries there are 9.6 Million Swedish residents and 63.7 Million in the UK. That is quite a difference in populations to treat, add onto that the fact that Sweden has a higher taxation rate across the board than the UK and they should have better healthcare – less people to treat and more per head in taxation to treat them with. Maybe we should raise taxes too to have better healthcare Neil?
As for a health service model that was set up in the fifties, I see no problem with that. Free healthcare for all was the basic model. Any structural changes within the NHS have been altered by every subsequent government since then and that really is the only thing left from the original model. Maybe you think we should pay for healthcare?
The one thing I do agree with you on is the fact that change is needed, cuts are not though.
That is exactly the point i was driving at, thank you Jason.
you should be a politician Jason ???? you put over a very good case…however the proof of the pudding is in the eating and successive governments have tried to sort out the NHS its a failing dinasaur and without a complete blue sky thinking overhaul im sure it will continue in much the same form, Im no statistician as you are im going on what the doctor on the tv show said …he said he was an advocate of the NHS and had never treat a private patient , he quoted many countries with a better quality of care than ours and much better survival rates, as well as a range of other good points …as ive said im not saying hes right im saying we need to look at alternatives without these scaremonger tactics. Im no tory but you seem to blame them for everything all the major parties have had a hand in this and the labour parties spend spend spend polocies have really left us in this situation. I believe state run organisations never work simply because theres no one at the top saying …hey what you spending that on ???? …the eu rules are ridiculous and those coming for treatment come from countries whose health service is below ours….however these places are hardly comparable economically with the uk the people almost still live in mud huts. This is the reason we should leave the eu its not a like for like organisation and how we agreed to the current rules is beyond me ..it was destined to fail from the start.. Enjoying the debate even though i feel a little unarmed
Which rural surgeries outside Hedon are you referring to when you say that if they close a few thousand more patients would join the Hedon practices’ register? The village surgeries in, for example, Keyingham, Patrington and Aldbrough are part of the larger surgeries in Hedon, Withernsea and Hornsea. Village patients are already registered with the relevant practices and are treated by the same medical staff in each case. Which other rural practices are there in Holderness? Please tell us.
Incidentally Jason, why do you not have the courtesy and courage to state your name on your frequent posts as requested by the editor?
The simple fact of the matter is that over the next seven years the extra funding that smaller LOCAL practices recieve will be reduced year by year until it is phased out. This will be to the detriment of many smaller GP practices and will force some to close. Centres of excellence is one thing but having to travel upwards of seven miles to access a GP is an unacceptable situation particularly for the elderly and vulnerable. I have spoke to several surgeries on this matter and the cuts are running at about 7% for year one. Larger practices that have a lot of patients may well be able to handle it. Unfortunately the smaller ones will very much be in danger of closure over the course of the next seven years. If this is not stopped now we will loose our infrastructure of local GPs and be beholdant to centres that have no family histories or time to listen.
A prime example is the new Virgin run Wilberforce health centre in Hull city centre. It says NHS all over it but it is really run by Virgin Healthcare. Doctors there are allocated eight minutes per patient appointment and if they overrun they are financially penalised. The NHS is slowly but surely being dismantled from within and what was once the envy of the civilised world is being reduced to a pale imitation of its former self run by private companies for a profit.
Not sure these cuts will effect us, i must however draw attention to a talk show i watched at the weekend (the big Question Sunday morning) there was rather an interesting exchange of views regards changed to services within the nhs …and i thought it made a lot of sense , people are always so against change and sometimes don’t even look properly at the alternatives being offered,> The changes were really all about altering things to get a better service that suits how we live today , centers of excellence and specialist centers similar to castle hill , We have very low quality of service compared with other european countries and need to change things around.to get a better service.
A comment from a local Doctor in the hull daily mail:
http://www.hulldailymail.co.uk/Doctor-wanrs-funding-changes-close-rural-East/story-20705569-detail/story.html
I think that says it all really Neil.
Hi – Just a reminder please Jason, that we prefer those leaving regular comments to leave their full names. Thanks.