Hospital trusts to undergo ‘use of resources’ ratings

[Northerner]

Health watchdogs will soon grade NHS hospital trusts on how efficiently they use their resources alongside reviews of the standard of care they provide.

From September, the CQC together with NHS Improvement will assess non-specialist acute trusts’ finances as well as a their workforce, estates and facilities. These findings will be released along with a summary of care performance in the CQC’s routine reports.

The finances of specialist acute, ambulance, mental health and community services will also fall under assessment after April 2019.

Appraisals will be carried out by NHS Improvement at the same time that CQC inspectors are looking at the safety and quality of care. Trusts’ use of resources will be rated either: outstanding; good; requires improvement; or inadequate.

http://www.publicfinance.co.uk/news/2017/08/hospital-trusts-be-undergo-use-resources-ratings

Sounds like another stick to beat people with...

 

[mikeyB]

It's sort of circular, a self fulfilling prophecy. The more you spend on checking something, the less money there is for the thing you are checking. Oh well. Somebody will realise that eventually.

Meanwhile, as you say, Northie, it's just another stick to beat people with. As if there aren't enough checks already.

 

[Northerner]

It's sort of circular, a self fulfilling prophecy. The more you spend on checking something, the less money there is for the thing you are checking. Oh well. Somebody will realise that eventually.

Meanwhile, as you say, Northie, it's just another stick to beat people with. As if there aren't enough checks already.

The trouble is, when you cut things to the bone any attempt at efficiency is undermined by a lack of resource to implement it, and you start to notice that things you thought you had found a way of improving now don't work as well as you hoped/predicted, but there is no way back

 

[Bill Stewardson]

Be interesting if somebody ran the same cheeks on the Govt, you know, trivial things like Hinckley Point 2 etc.

 

[Northerner]

Be interesting if somebody ran the same cheeks on the Govt, you know, trivial things like Hinckley Point 2 etc.

Indeed. And HS2, and the business case for first phase between London and Brum instead of in the North. Also, what always sticks in my mind was the absolute farce of the West Coast Mainline contract with Virgin, where the taxpayer shelled out £100m because of government incompetence and virtually got away with it. One rule for one...

 

[Bill Stewardson]

As a resident of "The northern poorhouse" I really don't know how they got away with that "Northern Powerhouse" con. It worked though, helped win them the most gutter level campaign ever.

As for the NHS, why oh why are proven top managers from industry not brought in to look at running it ??

 

[Copepod]

As a resident of "The northern poorhouse" I really don't know how they got away with that "Northern Powerhouse" con. It worked though, helped win them the most gutter level campaign ever.

As for the NHS, why oh why are proven top managers from industry not brought in to look at running it ??

Exactly - I don't want to be able to travel Leeds to London in a few minutes less, but I would like to be able to get to Sheffield and Manchester in less than an hour!
In the meantime, an appreciation that there's a difference between what's easy to measure and what's worth measuring in government monitoring and spending, for NHS, transport, energy projects etc, would be a start.

 

[Northerner]

As for the NHS, why oh why are proven top managers from industry not brought in to look at running it ??

Does anyone remember the BBC programme where Gerry Robinson tried to sort things out? Had to look it up, and interestingly it was quite a few years ago now (longer than I remember!) and under the last Labour government.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/3346920/Sir-Gerry-Robinson-How-I-would-fix-the-NHS.html

Plus ca change.... Opening paragraphs sound depressingly familiar 😱

 

[Bill Stewardson]

Exactly - I don't want to be able to travel Leeds to London in a few minutes less, but I would like to be able to get to Sheffield and Manchester in less than an hour!
In the meantime, an appreciation that there's a difference between what's easy to measure and what's worth measuring in government monitoring and spending, for NHS, transport, energy projects etc, would be a start.

Ive got a meeting at The Institute for Global Change on Thursday which means a jaunt to London. The Two hour journey there is fine by me- the cheapest ticket being £75 isn't- but it's over Three hours back so over Five hours on the day on a train,would be good if that was shorter.

The Sheff/Manc route is awful and has been for years. It's cattle class and not at all acceptable, bet it makes a profit though.

 

[mikeyB]

Scenic, though, Bill. Mind, I always try to take positives out of anything.😳

 

[Copepod]

Some of Bill's journey may be scenic, but I guess some of the 3 hour journey north will be in the dark. Agree 5 hours on a train in a day is a lot, but you're unlucky to have one slower journey - a different departure time could mean a 2 hour journey north, too, making 4 hours in total. Hope the meeting is worth it - could teleconference or watching talk online be possible, depending on type of meeting?

 

[mikeyB]

I reckon 6 plus hours in the back of an ambulance is a bit of a bugger for a twenty minute appointment. Very scenic, though

 

[Bill Stewardson]

It's not so scenic when there those with kids in buggies stuck in the aisles, or those who bring their entire house in cases.

Tiz a nice ride when the Two carriages are emptyish though, through the hills with the currant bun beaming down.

 

[Bill Stewardson]

Some of Bill's journey may be scenic, but I guess some of the 3 hour journey north will be in the dark. Agree 5 hours on a train in a day is a lot, but you're unlucky to have one slower journey - a different departure time could mean a 2 hour journey north, too, making 4 hours in total. Hope the meeting is worth it - could teleconference or watching talk online be possible, depending on type of meeting?

Not for this particular meeting, big stuff on the agenda, might be able to discuss some of it after.

Earlier departure from London would have severely increased the cost, Im not paying but that's not how I do things. Five hours is ridiculous, don't overlook the profit being made at the expense of convenience. Plus a brew and a butty will likely be £7.

Should it be a service or a profitable enterprise ??

 

[Northerner]

Not for this particular meeting, big stuff on the agenda, might be able to discuss some of it after.

Earlier departure from London would have severely increased the cost, Im not paying but that's not how I do things. Five hours is ridiculous, don't overlook the profit being made at the expense of convenience. Plus a brew and a butty will likely be £7.

Should it be a service or a profitable enterprise ??

Bill, you will no doubt remember the era of dirt-cheap public transport in South Yorkshire, where it was fixed at 1974 prices and subsidised through the rates - until Thatcher decided to 'deregulate' the bus companies in the mid-80s (except in London, of course) and prices increased by 2,000% overnight. 14p to the Fox House on the Derbyshire border, and 5-10p anywhere within town. It worked for everyone - cheaper for people to travel to low-paid jobs, cheaper to use regular, dependable public transport than use a car, so far less traffic on the roads. After deregulation - logjammed traffic every morning and evening, services dominated by one or two private companies (i.e. Stagecoach), considerably higher traffic pollution and no-one's rates went down.

It should be a service that the whole of society benefits from, not a business putting money in shareholder's pockets - the same applies to national rail servces, which are a natural monopoly - and anyway, why is it that so many of the franchises are owned by foreign governments? Just my opinion! 🙄

 

[Copepod]

Not for this particular meeting, big stuff on the agenda, might be able to discuss some of it after.

Earlier departure from London would have severely increased the cost, Im not paying but that's not how I do things. Five hours is ridiculous, don't overlook the profit being made at the expense of convenience. Plus a brew and a butty will likely be £7.

Should it be a service or a profitable enterprise ??

Take a flask of tea / coffee. Buy meal of sandwich (eg BLT), snack and soft drink, preferably from the Bradford founded national supermarket, all for £3. Surely any Yorkshire resident knows how to get good value. I haven't seen Yorkshire Teabottles of blackberry & raspberry tea on sale yet, but the free samples at Leeds Triathlon were very tasty and not as high sugar content as most other iced tea.