Heart Beat

October 4 – Consultants and nurses should work together to revive the ward round, senior clinicians said today. Physician and nursing leaders have worked together on a plan to restore the round and improve its quality.  It calls for morning ward rounds and established pre-round briefings.  There should also be summary sheets to give information to [...]

The NHS was set up in 1948 to provide free healthcare to all UK residents. It is funded by the national general taxation. Although the NHS provides a free service, you are not covered for everything. We explain what the breakdown of these charges is for you. What is free? Medical Care –   Individuals covered [...]

August 20 – The NHS is to get a network of quality groups set up to try to prevent the mistakes which allowed the care scandals in Stafford to develop, it has been announced. The plans were announced in a draft report from the new National Quality Board. Ministers admitted it had been published in [...]

July 25 – Nurses in an emergency department have been trained to spot victims of loan sharks. Some 25 staff at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Birmingham, have attended training about loan sharks, the Nursing Standard reports. They learnt where victims can get help and how loan sharks operate. The nurses were brought in because victims [...]

July 5 – A shortage of specialist district nurses may be responsible for the numbers of people who die in hospital when they might prefer to be at home, nursing leaders said yesterday. The Royal College of Nursing said it was “deeply concerned” that a survey of bereaved people found many dying people could not [...]

June 13 – A major campaign has been successfully recruiting NHS organisations in a drive to improve basic care for patients, it was announced today. Organised by the Patients Association and Nursing Standard magazine, the Care campaign calls on staff to provide four fundamentals of care at all times. These are: Communicate with compassion, Assist [...]

May 29 – Nursing leaders have welcomed the findings of the forum set up to advise the government on how to improve quality of care in hospitals. Prime Minister David Cameron moved on Friday to implement one of the recommendations of the Nursing and Care Quality Forum – promising to publish patient responses to the [...]

May 14 – Hospitals and community services across the NHS are under pressure from staffing shortages – placing in jeopardy hopes of saving money by shifting care to the home, nurses warned today. In one survey nurses reported growing numbers of patients receiving care in corridors or kept in ambulances because of queues for emergency [...]

May 4 – A nationwide handwashing campaign across hospitals in England and Wales has helped to slash some infection rates, according to new figures revealed last night. The Cleanyourhands campaign, the first one in the world to be rolled out nationally, aimed to reduce high levels of Staphylococcus aureus infection – meticillin resistant (MRSA) and [...]

April 2 – A half a billion pounds contract for community services in Surrey has been handed to Richard Branson’s Virgin company, it has been announced. The deal covers two areas of the county, the south-west and the north-west, together with some county-wide services. The deal is thought to be the largest “privatisation” yet in [...]