Last
Updated Wednesday 13th August
Charles
Street News
Patient Access Survey 2008 – Results (July 2008)
The
government’s GP Patient Survey – “your doctor, your experience, your say” – was
completed in April 2008 by MORI polls, and included a sample of patients from
this practice. Of the questionnaires sent out 52% were returned to MORI.
Charles Street has an outstanding score across all of the areas of the survey,
and the Satisfaction Rates are:
Telephone Access: 98%
48 Hour Access to a GP: 94%
Advance Booking: 93%
Appointment with a specific GP: 98%
Thank
you to all our patients for supporting us in this.
Quality and Outcomes Framework 100% performance (June 2008)
Once again Charles Street has been successful in
achieving a 100% performance on government targets for quality at the 31st
March 2008. The results (2007 / 2008) will be published in due course on the
link below, meanwhile you can find last year’s results
on the site (2006 / 2007).
The Information Centre: QOF 2006/07 online
results database
Charles Street Surgery starts an early morning worker’s surgery (June
2008)
You can now book an appointment to see a duty doctor from
7.10am in the morning on Tuesdays and Thursdays. We have set these appointments
up to improve access to our patients who work, and may otherwise have
difficulty in attending during the working day. All appointments are pre-booked only, and you will see
a duty doctor. Our normal Open Surgeries, which start at 8.30am
are unchanged. As with our other surgeries, registered on-line users can book
into these via on-line services on this website.
New Diagnostic Service Introduced (May 2008)
The practice has now been commissioned by Leeds Primary
Care Trust to provide a diagnostic Helicobacter Pylori breath-testing service
for patients of practices throughout the Leeds area. Helicobacter Pylori is a bacterium which
lives in the mucus layer of the stomach, and sticks to the stomach lining. It
can lead to the development of ulcers in the stomach (gastric ulcers) or in the
duodenum (duodenal ulcers) which is part of the small intestine that links the
stomach to the large intestine. H. Pylori is the most
important cause of such ulcers. Certain stomach
cancers are two to six times more common (though still very rare) in people who
are
infected with H. Pylori compared with people who are not infected. Referrals to
the service are made only direct from a GP.
Elsewhere
in the National Press
NHS
should not save patients' lives if it costs too much,
says watchdog
The Independent – Tue, 12 Aug 2008:
Patients cannot rely on the NHS to save their lives if the cost of doing so is
too great, the Government's medicines watchdog has ruled for the first time.
All in the mind: the cases that doctors can't explain
The Independent – Tue, 12 Aug 2008:
Most patients expect a quick diagnosis and cure from their doctor. But what if
nothing can be found? What if there is no medical explanation for the symptoms,
let alone a cure? More than one in four patients visiting their GP have unexplained pain or symptoms, according to a new
report.
GP deal
'has narrowed care gap'
BBC Online – Tue, 12 Aug 2008:
The GP contract introduced in 2004 has helped reduce gaps in care between
wealthy and poor areas, a study says.
Chronic pain link to vitamin D deficiency in women
The Herald – Tue, 12 Aug 2008:
WOMEN who have low levels of Vitamin D - found in oily fish and eggs - are more
likely to suffer from chronic pain, new research suggests.
NHS watchdog to tell patients how to buy medicine
unavailable on health service
Daily Telegraph – Tue, 12 Aug 2008:
Patients are to be given advice on drugs rejected by the NHS – so they can
choose to buy them privately. The National Institute for Health and Clinical
Excellence (NICE) is drawing up plans to provide patients with independent
medical guidance on treatments for diseases such as cancer. The advice would
include drugs that NICE has ruled the NHS should not use because they are too
expensive.
Michael White: It's hard being Nice
The Guardian – Tue, 12 Aug 2008:
Britons aren't as scared of cancer as they were generations ago when the C-word
was a great unmentionable. Nor are they as helpless in the face of its cruel,
often capricious, assaults, thanks to medical advances which improve by the
month. But progress creates new problems: who gets what treatment, who pays and
how wonderful are the wonder drugs anyway?
Arrogant, illogical and totally out of touch, NICE must be
scrapped ...it's killing too many people
Evening Standard – Tue, 12 Aug 2008:
Patronising. Bullying. Intimidating.
That is how the body which makes life-and-death decisions on the rationing of
NHS drugs was described in yesterday's Daily Mail - by two of the very experts
who advise it.
NHS: Dirty hospitals face hygiene crackdown
The Guardian – Tue, 12 Aug 2008:
NHS hospitals will be denied a licence to treat patients if they fail to
maintain standards of hygiene over the next eight months, under a new
inspection regime disclosed yesterday to the Guardian.
SHOULD OUR FORCES GET THEIR OWN HOSPITAL?
Daily Express – Tue, 12 Aug 2008:
OUR heroic soldiers lay down their lives to fight for Britain, taking to the
battlefield in harsh and unforgiving conditions for months on end. Already 290
troops have been killed in action in Iraq and Afghanistan and many hundreds
more injured. But for all their bravery these wounded soldiers are facing a
battle they should never have to wage – the right to recovery.
Nearly 100 medical records 'lost'
BBC Online – Tue, 12 Aug 2008:
The details of what records were lost were not released. The medical records of
nearly 100 people have been lost by the health service in Northern Ireland over
the last three years
NHS rationing is a reality we should deal with
The Times – Mon, 11 Aug 2008:
Professor Jonathan Waxman wrote eloquently and angrily in this space last week
about the “absurd and arrogant” decision by the National Institute for Health
and Clinical Excellence, NICE, not to recommend health authorities to give four
good new drugs to kidney cancer patients.
GPs get paid twice over for extended hours
Pulse – Mon, 11 Aug 2008:
Under the terms of a new LES agreement offered by South West Essex PCT, GPs who
sign up for extended hours by the end of the month will receive a bonus payment
equivalent to payment for the first two quarters of the year.
Yvonne Roberts: Social innovation has huge potential
The Guardian – Mon, 11 Aug 2008:
Lord Darzi, following his review of the NHS, is so
enamoured of its powers that he's set aside a 50m annual budget to encourage
its spread. Governments in Singapore, Denmark and China have also invested
generously.
Drug fund lottery for rare cancers
Financial Times – Mon, 11 Aug 2008:
Some 800 patients a year are being refused funding for drugs that can tackle –
but not cure – rare or advanced cancers, according to a survey by the Rarer
Cancers Forum, a patient group. The survey also reveals the apparently random
local process that decides both whether patients will receive drug treatment
for their condition and how they can access it.
One in four NHS patients denied latest cancer drugs
The Times – Mon, 11 Aug 2008:
One in four cancer patients who could benefit from the latest, most effective
drugs is being denied the treatments by the NHS, a report out today suggests.
Letters: Cancer treatments need rigorous assessment
The Times – Mon, 11 Aug 2008:
Sir, Jonathan Waxman (“We need cancer drugs. NICE (the National Institute for
Health and Clinical Excellence) must go”, August 8) is clearly upset at the
institute’s draft recommendations on the use of treatments for renal cancer.
Bullied by the NHS drug tsars
Daily Mail – Mon, 11 Aug 2008:
The drugs-rationing body for the NHS has been accused of bullying, ignoring and
patronising patients. The unprecedented attack follows the
highly-controversial decision to ban drugs that can extend the life of kidney
cancer victims.
Nice distinctions on cancer don't save lives By Karol Sikora
The Sunday Telegraph – Sun, 10 Aug 2008:
The decision by the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence
(Nice) about the funding for drugs for kidney cancer in the NHS came as a great
surprise. It is a tragedy for the 5,000 patients who get this disease every year
in Britain and also for their families.
£13bn NHS computer system failures affecting patient care
Daily Telegraph – Sun, 10 Aug 2008:
Appointments for suspected cancer sufferers, accident and emergency treatment
and scheduled operations have all been delayed by problems, and complaints have
soared.
Untested drugs offer cancer hope
The Observer – Sun, 10 Aug 2008:
NHS gives go-ahead to experimental treatments for hundreds of patients who have
failed to respond to conventional cures. Thousands of terminally ill cancer
patients are to be offered the chance to take experimental drugs that may
extend their life by months or even years, The Observer can reveal.
LOCK, STOCK & TWO BARRELS - Movies with cig scenes to
get X cert
The People – Sun, 10 Aug 2008:
Children should be banned from watching ANY film showing stars having a smoke,
top doctor’s claim. They fear kids are encouraged to light up when they see
their screen heroes puffing away.
Ministers to strip councils of power to run care homes
The Independent on Sunday – Sun, 10 Aug 2008:
Care for elderly, infirm and disabled people could be stripped from local
authority control under radical new government plans in an effort to end the
so-called "postcode lottery" that sees wildly different standards of
care across the country.
