National and International News
A paperless national health service
The perennial problem of patients' medical notes being lost is about to become a thing of the past. As Lyn Whitfield reports, electronic records are replacing the brown envelope.
The Guardian 10/12/03
Atkins diet may curb epilepsy
The Atkins diet - not always seen as a healthy way to shed weight - may help to prevent fits in children with epilepsy, a team of US scientists says.
The Guardian 10/12/03
Broadmoor lets out woman, 94, after 40 years
A woman of 94 has been released from Broadmoor high-security hospital after being kept there for 40 years, it is disclosed today.
The Guardian 10/12/03
Carers face a tangled web
The Children's green paper has highlighted the urgent need for care agencies to share more information on children at risk, but the data protection obstacles are immense, says Phil Cain.
The Guardian 10/12/03
Charity urges child porn amnesty
People who have downloaded child pornography could be offered an amnesty if they hand their computer hard drives over to police, it was reported.
The Guardian 10/12/03
Charity wants change in abortion law
Abortion services in the NHS are not given enough priority, leading to women being denied access to safe methods of termination, a report has claimed.
The Guardian 10/12/03
Drugs for depressed children banned
Modern antidepressant drugs which have made billions for the pharmaceutical industry will be banned from use in children today because of evidence, suppressed for years, that they can cause young patients to become suicidal.
The Guardian 10/12/03
Drugs? It's all about delivery
From diabetes to erectile dysfunction, inhalers promise almost instant results.
The Times 10/12/03
GPs to lose monopoly with extension of patient choice
Family doctors are to lose their monopoly as frontline providers of health care in a radical extension of patient choice in the NHS, ministers revealed yesterday.
The Independent 10/12/03
Great Pox was too nasty to survive
The medical mystery of why syphilis rapidly became less virulent when it reached Europe in 1496 has been solved by a British scientist: the germs were simply too destructive for their own good.
The Times 10/12/03
Killer argument
Twenty months ago, the Wanless report paved the way for massive public investment in healthcare. Yet when the report came out, its author was clear that there were limits to the ability of the NHS to offer choice to patients. Choice required spare capacity, he said, and there was precious little of that in the NHS. What people most wanted, Wanless argued, was access, not choice. His focus was therefore that maximum waiting times should be slashed from 18 months in 2001 to 12 this year, six in 2005 and three in 2008. Ministers accepted all of this, and it is now the key aim of health strategy. Yet the other issues did not go away, and yesterday they came back on to the agenda in two ways: first, in an interim report from "Wanless 2", a 20-year look at public health and health inequalities; and, second, in a Department of Health report setting out many ways in which choice could now be extended.
The Guardian 10/12/03
Out of sight, out of mind
For a century and a half, people deprived of their liberty on grounds of mental infirmity have been assured of regular visits by an independent inspectorate to assess their welfare and the standard of their care. In the 1840s, the task was entrusted to "lunacy commissioners"; today, essentially the same function is carried out by representatives of the Mental Health Act Commission. But is this historic safeguard about to be lost?
The Guardian 10/12/03
Out of the shadows
Governance in the public and voluntary sectors is moving up the political agenda - and important changes in the role of chief executives could be the result. Invitations are going out this week for members of a commission to put the governance of public services under scrutiny, and a debate is under way among charities about shaking up trustee boards' membership, assessment and rewards.
The Guardian 10/12/03
Patients in high places get to choose
John Reid has fallen in love with the word choice. This is obvious for all to see. Yesterday he doted on it so much that it was almost embarrassing.
The Times 10/12/03
Patients' own skin cells turned into potential Alzheimer's treatment
Patients with devastating brain conditions such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s could eventually be treated with cells from their own skin.
The Times 10/12/03
Plants firm banks on slim hope
Phytopharm, the company that develops drugs by studying plants, is in talks to develop a fat-busting food supplement and is preparing to start clinical trials in humans to find the effectiveness of its Alzheimer's treatment.
The Guardian 10/12/03
Pledge for NHS to put patients' wishes first
A cultural revolution in the NHS to put wishes of patients before the convenience of professionals was promised by Tony Blair yesterday as the government launched a white paper offering choice from the cradle to the grave.
The Guardian 10/12/03
Quick fixer
For a problem more than 50 years in the making, the suggested solution came quickly. Four months ago, the government asked Harry Cayton, its part-time "patient tsar", to examine how to break down the doctor-knows-best philosophy of the NHS and give people genuine choice in their use of services.
The Guardian 10/12/03
Staying clean through self-esteem
I am the facilitator of a support group for ex-drug users. The group is for former residential clients at Kenyon House, Bolton, Salford and Trafford mental health NHS trust's detox unit, plus outpatients who are stabilised on medication and trying to continue their detox in the community.
The Guardian 10/12/03
The active ingredient
We have been told that most drugs don't work in most sick people (The great drugs lottery, G2, December 9) and that the present generation of Britain's young people are the fattest, least fit and most likely to develop chronic disease and be the least fertile since records were kept (Teenagers facing a health time bomb, December 9). Furthermore, the NHS drug spend keeps rising to rates which require the Audit Commission to investigate.
The Guardian 10/12/03
Cheshire and Mersey News
999 clampdown on time wasters
Ambulance chiefs in Merseyside are planning to stop sending crews to patients who misuse the service.
Liverpool Echo 09/12/03
Disturbed patient gets life for siege
A psychiatric patient who held his doctor at gunpoint for 17 hours was today jailed for life.
Liverpool Echo 09/12/03
Tenants vote for private housing
People living in Kensington have voted to have their homes transferred from council ownership to a specially created housing association.
Liverpool Echo 09/12/03
Cumbria and Lancashire News
Nurses set to get patients' eye view
Members of East Lancashire Hospitals NHS trust board are to play doctors and nurses with local community group representatives as part of a revolutionary training scheme.
Lancashire Evening Telegraph 09/12/03
Greater Manchester News
Parents are reassured over flu virus
Health experts in Bolton are reassuring parents who are concerned about their children and flu.
Bolton Evening News 09/12/03
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