Escape into the Tea & Sympathy chat room #2

[Rockin' Robin]

@Rockin' Robin hope you are feeling better now.

Not really. I've had so may obstacles put in my way recently. Hospital appointments being cancelled. Then when I did attend a rescheduled appointment, it was for a completely different issue. Everything is a struggle, everything is a fight - and not just with my own difficulties.
How can I best describe the situation? I feel like I am on a tennis court, and the tennis balls are coming thick and fast in my direction. And I have only one racquet, to try to return them to my opponents!

Anyway, that is enough about me. I hope everyone else is doing ok. My best wishes to everyone.

 

[Sami Lee]

Hey there @Rockin' Robin !
How are you doing? It's always a bit scary joining a new forum...Just caught your post and wanted to say I'll look out for your posts, send some and words your way... It's really the best forum I've ever been on, so well run, no cliqueyness that I can see, people are so friendly and sensible, very funny too!

I came in here today because I'm rather overwhelmed by all the speculations about the king's health. I just want to read facts, not lots of guesswork about all sorts of possible, detailed and unpleasant treatments for some vague type of cancer that we really don't know about. Some people like to deal with worrying things by thinking about all the possibilities, other people just need the available facts.
The disgusting Hazno circus makes it all worse as far as I'm concerned. I can't imagine how awful it all is for the RF.
Then there's the Nostradamus fortune telling on top of all that!

I really like everyone on the forum, everyone has something interesting to say and I try to read every comment. But I've decided not to read/respond to any speculative posts. Reality is worrying enough without adding to it!

If you have been, thank you for listening!

 

[Sami Lee]

Not really. I've had so may obstacles put in my way recently. Hospital appointments being cancelled. Then when I did attend a rescheduled appointment, it was for a completely different issue. Everything is a struggle, everything is a fight - and not just with my own difficulties.
How can I best describe the situation? I feel like I am on a tennis court, and the tennis balls are coming thick and fast in my direction. And I have only one racquet, to try to return them to my opponents!

Anyway, that is enough about me. I hope everyone else is doing ok. My best wishes to everyone.

Thank you for your good wishes!
Just wanted to say that I really like your description of how your life is nowadays...

I feel like I am on a tennis court, and the tennis balls are coming thick and fast in my direction. And I have only one racquet, to try to return them to my opponents!

Decades ago, I lived in two under-developed countries. Living here, now in the UK is as bad as they were back then in those under-developed places.

In the UK, I've not seen/experienced such disorganisation and struggle in all my life. It's shocking to me that so many services and businesses can get so many things messed up!

You're right, it does seem like everything is a fight. Because it is!
It started maybe 5 yrs or so before the pandemic. Covid somehow seems to have made it all much worse.

It's no consolation for me to say 'you're definitely not alone' because when you're facing all those balls flying at you it does feel like you're the only one!
So I'm not at all diminishing your struggles....

Though from current experience and from everyone I speak with, it's all over the place. Even my Aussie and US friends are saying the same sort of things... :-(

I don't know what the answer is. Does anyone?

 

[Chita]

Hey there @Rockin' Robin !
How are you doing? It's always a bit scary joining a new forum...Just caught your post and wanted to say I'll look out for your posts, send some and words your way... It's really the best forum I've ever been on, so well run, no cliqueyness that I can see, people are so friendly and sensible, very funny too!

I came in here today because I'm rather overwhelmed by all the speculations about the king's health. I just want to read facts, not lots of guesswork about all sorts of possible, detailed and unpleasant treatments for some vague type of cancer that we really don't know about. Some people like to deal with worrying things by thinking about all the possibilities, other people just need the available facts.
The disgusting Hazno circus makes it all worse as far as I'm concerned. I can't imagine how awful it all is for the RF.
Then there's the Nostradamus fortune telling on top of all that!

I really like everyone on the forum, everyone has something interesting to say and I try to read every comment. But I've decided not to read/respond to any speculative posts. Reality is worrying enough without adding to it!

If you have been, thank you for listening!

OK,
@Rockin' Robin
you can't change the situation but you can change your attitude towards it.
So.....
how about we change the tennis balls and tennis court to files in a metal cabinet with drawers.

There are many files and they all need attention.
So you mentally put them into the drawers in priority order. Top priority one goes to the front of the top drawer and so on.

Visualise it.
Go to your quiet place, close your eyes and visualise it.
Then when you can see the files in your mind, you visualise taking them out as and when they need to be dealt with then shut the drawer and leave the rest where they are.

Now the barrage of stuff bombarding you has stopped. The other stuff sits patiently in the drawer and is hidden away until you need to attend to it.

You will start to feel more calm and more in control as you visualise all of this.

Then when you come to dealing with each "file" you will already be halway to coping with whatever it is.

Try it. Stop the tennis balls. Convert them to files and file them.
They are still there and still need attention but you will feel in control instead of under attack because you can take them on one at a time at your own pace.

XxX
---
@Sami Lee our political leaders are not up to the job.
Useless.
I don't know where it will end. In the UK and America in particular politicians all seem inept.
It is scary.

Thoughts of this are in a file in my mental filing cabinet. I will deal with them later.

 

[Rockin' Robin]

OK,
@Rockin' Robin
you can't change the situation but you can change your attitude towards it.
So.....
how about we change the tennis balls and tennis court to files in a metal cabinet with drawers.

There are many files and they all need attention.
So you mentally put them into the drawers in priority order. Top priority one goes to the front of the top drawer and so on.

Visualise it.
Go to your quiet place, close your eyes and visualise it.
Then when you can see the files in your mind, you visualise taking them out as and when they need to be dealt with then shut the drawer and leave the rest where they are.

Now the barrage of stuff bombarding you has stopped. The other stuff sits patiently in the drawer and is hidden away until you need to attend to it.

You will start to feel more calm and more in control as you visualise all of this.

Then when you come to dealing with each "file" you will already be halway to coping with whatever it is.

Try it. Stop the tennis balls. Convert them to files and file them.
They are still there and still need attention but you will feel in control instead of under attack because you can take them on one at a time at your own pace.

XxX
---
@Sami Lee our political leaders are not up to the job.
Useless.
I don't know where it will end. In the UK and America in particular politicians all seem inept.
It is scary.

Thoughts of this are in a file in my mental filing cabinet. I will deal with them later.

Thank you Chita for this advice, I will try to put it into practice.

 

[Sami Lee]

OK,
@Rockin' Robin
you can't change the situation but you can change your attitude towards it.
So.....
how about we change the tennis balls and tennis court to files in a metal cabinet with drawers.

There are many files and they all need attention.
So you mentally put them into the drawers in priority order. Top priority one goes to the front of the top drawer and so on.

Visualise it.
Go to your quiet place, close your eyes and visualise it.
Then when you can see the files in your mind, you visualise taking them out as and when they need to be dealt with then shut the drawer and leave the rest where they are.

Now the barrage of stuff bombarding you has stopped. The other stuff sits patiently in the drawer and is hidden away until you need to attend to it.

You will start to feel more calm and more in control as you visualise all of this.

Then when you come to dealing with each "file" you will already be halway to coping with whatever it is.

Try it. Stop the tennis balls. Convert them to files and file them.
They are still there and still need attention but you will feel in control instead of under attack because you can take them on one at a time at your own pace.

XxX
---
@Sami Lee our political leaders are not up to the job.
Useless.
I don't know where it will end. In the UK and America in particular politicians all seem inept.
It is scary.

Thoughts of this are in a file in my mental filing cabinet. I will deal with them later.

Hello @Chita!

Love your filing cabinet visualisation! So I took a note out of a file drawer and adjusted the instructions a wee bit...
I just took all my tennis balls and dumped them in a notional black bin bag!

If there's important balls in there, they'll bounce back to me! Had a lovely relaxed day yesterday and today Thank you!

Completely agree with you re: our politicians.
When BoJo became PM, I wrote to my MP politely outlining his likely performance and demise.
Apart from the pandemic malarkey, it all came true - sadly. (I'm not any sort of soothsayer - it was just obvious what sort of character he is.)
It's been downhill all the way from there...
IMHO, 40 years of the EU made our leaders into rubber stampers and they forgot how to make decisions and govern responsibly.

 

[Fredsnail]

Public services are at breaking point due to lack of funding since 2008 when the world recession started.

Yet despite this we are still being promised tax cuts - we can't afford to have tax cuts if you want public services.

So many people struggle to access services they need because there is no capacity or waiting lists are far too long.

My neighbour needs a hip replacement. Due to the pain she's now more or less confined to a wheelchair, she's depressed and is on all sorts of medication while she's waiting for her op. She's been classed as urgent- but her estimated wait time is 3 to 4 years.

 

[DanDanTheIceCreamMan]

Public services are at breaking point due to lack of funding since 2008 when the world recession started.

Yet despite this we are still being promised tax cuts - we can't afford to have tax cuts if you want public services.

So many people struggle to access services they need because there is no capacity or waiting lists are far too long.

My neighbour needs a hip replacement. Due to the pain she's now more or less confined to a wheelchair, she's depressed and is on all sorts of medication while she's waiting for her op. She's been classed as urgent- but her estimated wait time is 3 to 4 years.

The NHS is in the toilet right now. It needs so much funding... I think the tories are promising stuff knowing full well they wont have to deliver.

 

[Sami Lee]

The NHS is in the toilet right now. It needs so much funding... I think the tories are promising stuff knowing full well they wont have to deliver.

Someone should push the flush!!

It's outrageous that so many people are waiting for treatment. In 2024, in a first world country.

This isn't happening all over Europe where there are comparable sized populations and the per capita funding of healthcare is higher than UK's.

From what I see, it's not necessarily more funding but funding/resources managed and used more effectively and primarily for patient care ...

(At the moment, as it happens, I'm up writing an informal assessment paper, a think piece, for a body with an interest in these things.
The NHS persists in an antiquated management model and culture with loads of bits bolted on over the years and other bits hacked away. One of the worst things they (Thatcher) did was to introduce 'internal markets' to 'cut costs' - which has led to innumerable and costly avoidable injuries and fatalities. I won't go into what Bliar did - far too shocking.
Simply, the whole malarkey needs to be humanely euthanised and replaced by e.g. the Aussie HC system, imho.)

 

[Chita]

NHS gets plenty money.
It spends most of it on legal costs.
The rest is badly managed.
Stuff like laundry used to be done in house.
Now it isn't. It could be cheaper if done in house. That's just one example.
They waste money all over the place.

They create work by being inefficient. They have to pay people wages to work the extra hours needed to do the work created by their inefficiency.
Be more efficient, get the work done in fewer hours and cut the wage bill.
They get extra money for night shift.
Its a 24 hour job. Thats the job.
Pay a flat rate.

There are lots of computer systems for different things that do not "talk to" each other.

There is a computer system in place that can handle everything - get all records in one central place but the management can't organise it so the separate systems can all be gradualy transferred to the main one.

So staff have to input stuff into each system one by one.
Each system logs them out after so many seconds so they are constantly having to re enter passwords.
Imagine how much time is wasted doing this.

Picture the scene......
ER reception.. long queue, patient details entered so the doc/nurse knows who and why they are there,
then on the next system the same details are entered in case patient might need to go to the pharmacy later for a prescription,
then entered on another in case an ambulance needs to be booked for them if they go home later,
then details are entered into yet another system in case they need admitting to a ward after being seen.

Reception have to enter details on all systems. Long queue gets longer.
Doc/nurse have to update details on all systems. Patient waits while they do this.

There is a special reception for people sent to the hospital via the 111 number.
Those people usually go to the main reception by mistake and have to be sent to the 111 desk - all this wasting time at the emergency desk which is the main reception for everyone else - walk ins, ambulance - actual emergencies.

The paramedics have to queue with everyone else to get their patient details entered on all systems by the receptionist.
If they had their own computer in the ambulance bay and if everything was on the one system,
the paramedics could enter their patient details, the system could identify them and it would save time getting the patient through the system to be seen by an ER doc/nurse.
Taking so much time on this slows things down and causes longer waits all through each department.

GP referals are by letter.
They could all be done by computer if there werent so many different systems.

Then you have newly created diversity departments with staff paid high salaries to do the job HR/Personnel departments should be doing anyway.
Management is top heavy.
They have a meeting to decide when to have a meeting.
Junior staff get asked for feedback to help make the service better.
Meetings are held to discuss their feedback then they are told the people holding the meeting can't do anything about their concerns so they are advised to go to their line managers who aren't in this meeting so they must arrange a meeting with them.

Induction courses are held many months after staff have started work.
HR write and ask for new staff to bring in ID.
Then the wages dept write and ask.
Then IT dept ask for it so they can issue name tags and keyfobs for access doors and photocopiers etc.
Staff can be in post for weeks before they get the necessary door passes even though their ID was confirmed by HR long before they started the job.
Departments and their computer systems are not linked to each other so everything has to be done several times.
New staff get sent on courses and then told they cant do the course because they havent been issued with log in ID permission for the system the training course is for.
Need I go on???

The head of it all is on a quarter of a million a year salary.
The NHS budget is enough to run it.
It is the management wasting so much of it that is the problem.





Now I need a lie down!

 

[Happy Lady]

You sound as though you've spent time working in the NHS @Chita. So have I, and you are correct in saying that management is top heavy. Managers feel great having assistant managers working for them/on their team, so get more ... And more. It's pathetic. Then it's established about three people are all doing the same job - but get different results!!

Meetings - HA! Yep once again you've hit the nail on the head. Meetings are held to decide what to discuss at meetings, then sub-meetings take place for no sensible reasons. Actions are distributed and logged but crash through deadlines because they are simply not dealt with.

Bullying is absolutely rife. Staff find it near impossible to organise a life outside work, especially doctors and nurses. They worry in case their shift runs over, in which case they have to make rush decisions and arrangements for their kids to be looked after. They miss socialising with family and friends. Colleagues fail to turn up at work, so more pressure is put on those already working.

Money is wasted paying bank staff to cover absences, but guess what - the bank staff are already on NHS payroll, they just want paying more as they can earn more with agency work. Agency staffing needs capping IMO and only used as a last resort.

Why are appointments being cancelled? Well, slappa my thigh but the Consultant has gone on holiday at the last minute, or is giving a lecture and his secretary forgot, or they're training somewhere in the distance.

I could go on. Guess what a Director said to me when I resigned from the NHS? "You know too much."

 

[Chita]

You sound as though you've spent time working in the NHS @Chita. So have I, and you are correct in saying that management is top heavy. Managers feel great having assistant managers working for them/on their team, so get more ... And more. It's pathetic. Then it's established about three people are all doing the same job - but get different results!!

Meetings - HA! Yep once again you've hit the nail on the head. Meetings are held to decide what to discuss at meetings, then sub-meetings take place for no sensible reasons. Actions are distributed and logged but crash through deadlines because they are simply not dealt with.

Bullying is absolutely rife. Staff find it near impossible to organise a life outside work, especially doctors and nurses. They worry in case their shift runs over, in which case they have to make rush decisions and arrangements for their kids to be looked after. They miss socialising with family and friends. Colleagues fail to turn up at work, so more pressure is put on those already working.

Money is wasted paying bank staff to cover absences, but guess what - the bank staff are already on NHS payroll, they just want paying more as they can earn more with agency work. Agency staffing needs capping IMO and only used as a last resort.

Why are appointments being cancelled? Well, slappa my thigh but the Consultant has gone on holiday at the last minute, or is giving a lecture and his secretary forgot, or they're training somewhere in the distance.

I could go on. Guess what a Director said to me when I resigned from the NHS? "You know too much."

@Happy Lady
Bit in bold - or consultant is topping up their already high salary by doing private consultations from their home "office" or in a private hospital or even in a different section of the NHS hospital theyve just cancelled the (less lucrative) appointment in.

 

[Sami Lee]

NHS gets plenty money.
It spends most of it on legal costs.
The rest is badly managed.
Stuff like laundry used to be done in house.
Now it isn't. It could be cheaper if done in house. That's just one example.
They waste money all over the place.

They create work by being inefficient. They have to pay people wages to work the extra hours needed to do the work created by their inefficiency.
Be more efficient, get the work done in fewer hours and cut the wage bill.
They get extra money for night shift.
Its a 24 hour job. Thats the job.
Pay a flat rate.

There are lots of computer systems for different things that do not "talk to" each other.

There is a computer system in place that can handle everything - get all records in one central place but the management can't organise it so the separate systems can all be gradualy transferred to the main one.

So staff have to input stuff into each system one by one.
Each system logs them out after so many seconds so they are constantly having to re enter passwords.
Imagine how much time is wasted doing this.

Picture the scene......
ER reception.. long queue, patient details entered so the doc/nurse knows who and why they are there,
then on the next system the same details are entered in case patient might need to go to the pharmacy later for a prescription,
then entered on another in case an ambulance needs to be booked for them if they go home later,
then details are entered into yet another system in case they need admitting to a ward after being seen.

Reception have to enter details on all systems. Long queue gets longer.
Doc/nurse have to update details on all systems. Patient waits while they do this.

There is a special reception for people sent to the hospital via the 111 number.
Those people usually go to the main reception by mistake and have to be sent to the 111 desk - all this wasting time at the emergency desk which is the main reception for everyone else - walk ins, ambulance - actual emergencies.

The paramedics have to queue with everyone else to get their patient details entered on all systems by the receptionist.
If they had their own computer in the ambulance bay and if everything was on the one system,
the paramedics could enter their patient details, the system could identify them and it would save time getting the patient through the system to be seen by an ER doc/nurse.
Taking so much time on this slows things down and causes longer waits all through each department.

GP referals are by letter.
They could all be done by computer if there werent so many different systems.

Then you have newly created diversity departments with staff paid high salaries to do the job HR/Personnel departments should be doing anyway.
Management is top heavy.
They have a meeting to decide when to have a meeting.
Junior staff get asked for feedback to help make the service better.
Meetings are held to discuss their feedback then they are told the people holding the meeting can't do anything about their concerns so they are advised to go to their line managers who aren't in this meeting so they must arrange a meeting with them.

Induction courses are held many months after staff have started work.
HR write and ask for new staff to bring in ID.
Then the wages dept write and ask.
Then IT dept ask for it so they can issue name tags and keyfobs for access doors and photocopiers etc.
Staff can be in post for weeks before they get the necessary door passes even though their ID was confirmed by HR long before they started the job.
Departments and their computer systems are not linked to each other so everything has to be done several times.
New staff get sent on courses and then told they cant do the course because they havent been issued with log in ID permission for the system the training course is for.
Need I go on???

The head of it all is on a quarter of a million a year salary.
The NHS budget is enough to run it.
It is the management wasting so much of it that is the problem.

Now I need a lie down!

LOVE IT!!!

Thank you Ma'am! Or should I say doctor? nurse? You know just what I'm talking about.

The mess is shocking, isn't it?

You're absolutely right - piss poor proliferative management, comms systems that are out of the ark and inefficiencies in every dept. Together with unnecessary extravagant spending.

After Bliar's expensive Spine debacle, I doubt whether anyone has the appetite for being ripped off again. We didn't get what we paid for....

Countries like Germany spend 3x as much as the NHS does on admin. It means that Germans get an efficient system with much shorter wait times and fewer admin fubars.
NHS spends 2p per £ on admin and brags that it's saving money (and doesn't like talking about the real costs of long wait times and frequent admin fubars due to poor/old systems and tools). You get what you pay for...

The NHSLA gets about a third of the NHS budget, last time I checked it was c. £57Billion. It makes me so angry-demoralised so I don't like looking up those figures. It's not beyond logic to suspect that the NHSLA is at least partly responsible for the 'need' for such an eyewatering amount. It's a whole get-out-of-jail-free ticket for the careless and an earner for lawyers whose skillsets aren't such a good fit for the commercial world.

£16Billion/yr on late interventions - for children alone. Who knows the cost for adults?

Yes, exactly! The agency nurse wheeze has made a lot of current andex-NHS people rich. No reason that it shouldn't be in-house at half the cost. Like other service depts that used to be in-house, as you say.

Diversity depts? Grrrr. Imho, an expensive distraction from the real issues, and an inefficient way to try and deal with the horrendous endemic culture of bullying (which itself is hugely costly - NHS has highest sickness rate of any org in UK.)

On the face of it £320K (including pension benefit) is low for the head of a very large and complex organisation. It's a caretaker salary, I don't think she's expected to innovate or change much but the pictures on the office wall!! You get what you pay for...



Some speculate that gvts are deliberately choking funds to wind down what's become a very tired old white elephant and create an obvious need to slay it. That would be a very devious way to do it. We need to have an open national conversation on closing the NHS down and building a modern, probably hybrid taxpayer/low cost insurance funded, system. The public - patients - have to be partners in this project otherwise it'll soon become a mirror of the old top-down patronising white elephant. imho.

I could go on and on (and no doubt will elsewhere!) Better stop here before I get carried away with my NHS excoriations.

 

[Chita]

LOVE IT!!!

Thank you Ma'am! Or should I say doctor? nurse? You know just what I'm talking about.

The mess is shocking, isn't it?

You're absolutely right - piss poor proliferative management, comms systems that are out of the ark and inefficiencies in every dept. Together with unnecessary extravagant spending.

After Bliar's expensive Spine debacle, I doubt whether anyone has the appetite for being ripped off again. We didn't get what we paid for....

Countries like Germany spend 3x as much as the NHS does on admin. It means that Germans get an efficient system with much shorter wait times and fewer admin fubars.
NHS spends 2p per £ on admin and brags that it's saving money (and doesn't like talking about the real costs of long wait times and frequent admin fubars due to poor/old systems and tools). You get what you pay for...

The NHSLA gets about a third of the NHS budget, last time I checked it was c. £57Billion. It makes me so angry-demoralised so I don't like looking up those figures. It's not beyond logic to suspect that the NHSLA is at least partly responsible for the 'need' for such an eyewatering amount. It's a whole get-out-of-jail-free ticket for the careless and an earner for lawyers whose skillsets aren't such a good fit for the commercial world.

£16Billion/yr on late interventions - for children alone. Who knows the cost for adults?

Yes, exactly! The agency nurse wheeze has made a lot of current andex-NHS people rich. No reason that it shouldn't be in-house at half the cost. Like other service depts that used to be in-house, as you say.

Diversity depts? Grrrr. Imho, an expensive distraction from the real issues, and an inefficient way to try and deal with the horrendous endemic culture of bullying (which itself is hugely costly - NHS has highest sickness rate of any org in UK.)

On the face of it £320K (including pension benefit) is low for the head of a very large and complex organisation. It's a caretaker salary, I don't think she's expected to innovate or change much but the pictures on the office wall!! You get what you pay for...



Some speculate that gvts are deliberately choking funds to wind down what's become a very tired old white elephant and create an obvious need to slay it. That would be a very devious way to do it. We need to have an open national conversation on closing the NHS down and building a modern, probably hybrid taxpayer/low cost insurance funded, system. The public - patients - have to be partners in this project otherwise it'll soon become a mirror of the old top-down patronising white elephant. imho.

I could go on and on (and no doubt will elsewhere!) Better stop here before I get carried away with my NHS excoriations.

It's impossible to write a short post about it isn't it.
There's SO much to say.
---
PS
I don't work in the NHS.

 

[Sami Lee]

It's impossible to write a short post about it isn't it.
There's SO much to say.
---
PS
I don't work in the NHS.

Well, I definitely think the NHS should hire you ASAP to sort them out!! Your understanding and observations are so accurate and important.

Yes, sadly, there's always more to say about the sheer mess that managers have arrogantly got the NHS into.
Everywhere you look in the NHS, it's not working in some way or other.

I try to hold on to the fact that there are many dedicated staff who are good guys and try their best to make things better for patients.
But, I fear that every day that they're at work, there's one mess after another for them to try and sort out, or struggle with.

The ubiquitous bullying is the worst thing, along with the criminal cover-up culture.

I won't get started on Primary Care - GPs are in a self-aggrandised world of their own and making even more of a mess of things and patient's lives.

 

[Chita]

The recent post office shenanigans coming to full light has opened a lot of peoples eyes but its not just the post office/royal mail.
The managers in the NHS are a similar 'type' to many in local authorities, the civil service and the post office.
There's a lot of teachers who are the same type as well.


They are clever at looking busy but aren't actually doing anything. They all need an overhaul.
Civil service - reckons it can't handle all the asylum processing.
As far as I know, governement departments [in times of crisis] can, if they could be arsed send out circulars to all departments asking for help from others.
Staff can do temporary transfers, secondments... whatever. They could have done this to set up an asylum processing system.

A lot of local offices of the DWP have been gradually winding down over the last few years. The bulk of the staff were moved to larger [newer] buildings in cities and older/senior staff were eased out via redundancy, and natural wastage etc etc. The local offices were kept open with only a skeleton staff there and many others were working from home - especially during the lockdowns.

Money wasted setting them all up with home computers etc. because during covid many of those home workers werent getting much work pinged to their computers because the staff in the big new city offices were doing the work and the ones sitting in the old buildings waiting for them to close down were really there keeping the lights on until the lease was up.

The home workers were mostly watching telly with one eye, keeping another eye on their inbox and just counting the days until they could retire or get their redundancy.
All on full pay.

Somebody high up could have rounded up the ones on full pay and doing feck all and got them trained up on processing asylum claims.
Pay them a bonus. Overtime as an incentive. Backlog could've been sorted.

Civil service did that when the miner's strike was on because their workload in those areas shot up.
People came to the coalfield areas from all over to help out. They got travel expenses, overnight stay expenses, overtime etc.

When the Building societies turned into Banks and the customers were entitled to shares, the bank staff's workload shot up.
So the Banks set up specialist departments to deal with all the shares allocations. The departments were made up of staff from all over who came on temporary secondment to the new departments to get cracking on the piles of work that needed to be done.
Same when all the PPI claims hit them.
They tackled the backlog and eventually everyone's claim was processed and sorted. It took time and patience, but they did it.

The Census records are all gradually going online. Its taking ages but it is gradually getting done.

Fecking NHS need to make a start with that massive mainframe computer system and gradually transfer all the data from their other six or seven [or whatever it is] systems and get the whole country's records in one place.
Then get it backed up bloody watertight.
Set up some departments, get staff to man them [on secondment or whatever, pay them overtime, night rate, whatever fecking rate needs to be paid,] heads down, shoulders to the grindstone, concentrate, grit and determination ... and GET IT DONE.

That would then start to save time at every point where patients go to a desk to be processed for anything. ER admission via walk in, or 111 or ambulance, transfer to a ward, pharmacy, x ray, plaster clinic, etc etc etc
All those processes would then take fewer man hours to carry out.
Staff no longer needed in those roles could be utilised elsewhere - or fewer people doing that job get employed leaving more of the budget to employ nurses, doctors etc and maybe even have a bit spare to increase their pay. Eventually.

It cant be fixed in one go.

But a good foundation builds a strong house.
Start with that and fix that and then the rest will follow in time.

 

[Doodlebug005]

The recent post office shenanigans coming to full light has opened a lot of peoples eyes but its not just the post office/royal mail.
The managers in the NHS are a similar 'type' to many in local authorities, the civil service and the post office.
There's a lot of teachers who are the same type as well.


They are clever at looking busy but aren't actually doing anything. They all need an overhaul.
Civil service - reckons it can't handle all the asylum processing.
As far as I know, governement departments [in times of crisis] can, if they could be arsed send out circulars to all departments asking for help from others.
Staff can do temporary transfers, secondments... whatever. They could have done this to set up an asylum processing system.

A lot of local offices of the DWP have been gradually winding down over the last few years. The bulk of the staff were moved to larger [newer] buildings in cities and older/senior staff were eased out via redundancy, and natural wastage etc etc. The local offices were kept open with only a skeleton staff there and many others were working from home - especially during the lockdowns.

Money wasted setting them all up with home computers etc. because during covid many of those home workers werent getting much work pinged to their computers because the staff in the big new city offices were doing the work and the ones sitting in the old buildings waiting for them to close down were really there keeping the lights on until the lease was up.

The home workers were mostly watching telly with one eye, keeping another eye on their inbox and just counting the days until they could retire or get their redundancy.
All on full pay.

Somebody high up could have rounded up the ones on full pay and doing feck all and got them trained up on processing asylum claims.
Pay them a bonus. Overtime as an incentive. Backlog could've been sorted.

Civil service did that when the miner's strike was on because their workload in those areas shot up.
People came to the coalfield areas from all over to help out. They got travel expenses, overnight stay expenses, overtime etc.

When the Building societies turned into Banks and the customers were entitled to shares, the bank staff's workload shot up.
So the Banks set up specialist departments to deal with all the shares allocations. The departments were made up of staff from all over who came on temporary secondment to the new departments to get cracking on the piles of work that needed to be done.
Same when all the PPI claims hit them.
They tackled the backlog and eventually everyone's claim was processed and sorted. It took time and patience, but they did it.

The Census records are all gradually going online. Its taking ages but it is gradually getting done.

Fecking NHS need to make a start with that massive mainframe computer system and gradually transfer all the data from their other six or seven [or whatever it is] systems and get the whole country's records in one place.
Then get it backed up bloody watertight.
Set up some departments, get staff to man them [on secondment or whatever, pay them overtime, night rate, whatever fecking rate needs to be paid,] heads down, shoulders to the grindstone, concentrate, grit and determination ... and GET IT DONE.

That would then start to save time at every point where patients go to a desk to be processed for anything. ER admission via walk in, or 111 or ambulance, transfer to a ward, pharmacy, x ray, plaster clinic, etc etc etc
All those processes would then take fewer man hours to carry out.
Staff no longer needed in those roles could be utilised elsewhere - or fewer people doing that job get employed leaving more of the budget to employ nurses, doctors etc and maybe even have a bit spare to increase their pay. Eventually.

It cant be fixed in one go.

But a good foundation builds a strong house.
Start with that and fix that and then the rest will follow in time.

I’m in Ireland but the crappy health service is “universal” ( pardon the service is universal bit) For example one city hospital here was in the news for having 140 patients waiting on trolleys ( a day) You are correct about getting the foundations right… We have a hospital manager living nearby- she has 3 masters degrees ( another neighbour thinks she bought them off the internet) She hasn’t a spark of sense- but lots of money …. I can’t say much about her money wasting ways … I just know … I also know when she’s “working from home” she is often not even in the country🫣…. how some people get managerial posts is beyond me…. Would any premier league club employ a manager who never even kicked a football ( but knew the theory?) no… so why are hospitals full of pen pushers… Also why are hospital consultants paid for by the health service tending to private patients on health care time? It’s one or the other- treat private or public patients but choose your lane… they really get their cake and eat it- ok they worked hard to reach their registrar or consultancy posts with huge pay packets- doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be grafting on the wards/ emergency depts… and breathe

 

[Olebiscuitbarrel]

NHS gets plenty money.
It spends most of it on legal costs.
The rest is badly managed.
Stuff like laundry used to be done in house.
Now it isn't. It could be cheaper if done in house. That's just one example.
They waste money all over the place.

They create work by being inefficient. They have to pay people wages to work the extra hours needed to do the work created by their inefficiency.
Be more efficient, get the work done in fewer hours and cut the wage bill.
They get extra money for night shift.
Its a 24 hour job. Thats the job.
Pay a flat rate.

There are lots of computer systems for different things that do not "talk to" each other.

There is a computer system in place that can handle everything - get all records in one central place but the management can't organise it so the separate systems can all be gradualy transferred to the main one.

So staff have to input stuff into each system one by one.
Each system logs them out after so many seconds so they are constantly having to re enter passwords.
Imagine how much time is wasted doing this.

Picture the scene......
ER reception.. long queue, patient details entered so the doc/nurse knows who and why they are there,
then on the next system the same details are entered in case patient might need to go to the pharmacy later for a prescription,
then entered on another in case an ambulance needs to be booked for them if they go home later,
then details are entered into yet another system in case they need admitting to a ward after being seen.

Reception have to enter details on all systems. Long queue gets longer.
Doc/nurse have to update details on all systems. Patient waits while they do this.

There is a special reception for people sent to the hospital via the 111 number.
Those people usually go to the main reception by mistake and have to be sent to the 111 desk - all this wasting time at the emergency desk which is the main reception for everyone else - walk ins, ambulance - actual emergencies.

The paramedics have to queue with everyone else to get their patient details entered on all systems by the receptionist.
If they had their own computer in the ambulance bay and if everything was on the one system,
the paramedics could enter their patient details, the system could identify them and it would save time getting the patient through the system to be seen by an ER doc/nurse.
Taking so much time on this slows things down and causes longer waits all through each department.

GP referals are by letter.
They could all be done by computer if there werent so many different systems.

Then you have newly created diversity departments with staff paid high salaries to do the job HR/Personnel departments should be doing anyway.
Management is top heavy.
They have a meeting to decide when to have a meeting.
Junior staff get asked for feedback to help make the service better.
Meetings are held to discuss their feedback then they are told the people holding the meeting can't do anything about their concerns so they are advised to go to their line managers who aren't in this meeting so they must arrange a meeting with them.

Induction courses are held many months after staff have started work.
HR write and ask for new staff to bring in ID.
Then the wages dept write and ask.
Then IT dept ask for it so they can issue name tags and keyfobs for access doors and photocopiers etc.
Staff can be in post for weeks before they get the necessary door passes even though their ID was confirmed by HR long before they started the job.
Departments and their computer systems are not linked to each other so everything has to be done several times.
New staff get sent on courses and then told they cant do the course because they havent been issued with log in ID permission for the system the training course is for.
Need I go on???

The head of it all is on a quarter of a million a year salary.
The NHS budget is enough to run it.
It is the management wasting so much of it that is the problem.





Now I need a lie down!

Amazing, and sadly so accurate.

 

[LadyMuck]

It's impossible to write a short post about it isn't it.
There's SO much to say.
---
PS
I don't work in the NHS.

You should do Chita! You'd sort them out.

I agree with everything you said

 

[Allflightscancelled]

Hope @Who’sYerDaddy is ok. Has been quiet recently, and I noticed she posted something late last night but by the time I’d finished typing a response she’d deleted it .

If you're reading, let us know you’re ok