A trainee teacher with primary refractory Hodgkin’s lymphoma has launched a High Court action against her primary care trust, NHS Surrey, which has refused to pay for her treatment with an unlicensed drug. Philippa Bigham, aged 28, from Frimley, Surrey, has been given a prognosis of two years’ survival without a bone marrow transplantation. But her medical team at the Royal Free Hospital in London want her to have treatment with radiolabelled basiliximab, a monoclonal antibody conjugated with radioactive iodine and also known as CHT-25, before she has the transplantation. The primary care trust has refused to pay for the drug, which costs £3000 ({euro}3500; $4900) for a course of treatment. Basiliximab is licensed in the United Kingdom for use in renal transplant rejection but the radiolabelled version is not yet licensed.
The confidentiality of medical records is threatened by government plans to relax laws on data protection, doctors' leaders told the Guardian yesterday. Dr Hamish Meldrum, chairman of the British Medical Association, said the profession was "extremely concerned" about legislation tabled by Jack Straw, the justice secretary, which would allow the Department of Health to share information on NHS databases with other ministries and private companies.
A woman died after an experienced surgeon unintentionally attempted to take out the wrong organ during an operating theatre complication. Amy Joyce Francis, 77, was due to have a kidney removed at the Royal Gwent Hospital in July 2010 but instead the surgeon tried to remove her liver. The woman from Newport suffered a fatal heart attack after a loss of blood. The coroner recorded a narrative verdict which was fully accepted by the Aneurin Bevan Health Board.
Satisfaction with NHS is high but it may be bad news Satisfaction with the NHS has been rising steadily for the past decade and is at an all-time high – but that could spell bad news for patients. The more satisfied patients are with their medical care, the more likely they are to die, US researchers have found.
Doctors' leaders warn situation could diminish patient trust and lead to more NHS services being run by private operators. GPs preparing to take charge of £60bn of NHS funds have been found to have shareholdings in private healthcare firms, prompting alarm about family doctors profiting from direct conflicts of interest.
Although the number of patients seeking treatment elsewhere in the European Union is small,3 this could easily change, especially if people are faced with growing waiting lists or other forms of rationing as the new groups seek to control their budgets. British residents have had the right to obtain treatment in another EU country since 1971.4 Initially, the opportunities were limited mainly to people who fell ill when abroad or, less often, when the NHS agreed that there were good reasons for patients being treated abroad (for example, a citizen of another country resident here returning home to give birth
The NICE clinical guideline on fertility covers: * the best forms of treatment for people who have problems getting pregnant * ways of treating people who have a known condition or reason for their fertility problems * ways of treating people when no reason for their fertility problems can be found
he NHSLA is a Special Health Authority (part of the NHS), responsible for handling negligence claims made against NHS bodies in England. In addition to dealing with claims when they arise, we have an active risk management programme to help raise standards of care in the NHS and hence reduce the number of incidents leading to claims. We also monitor human rights case-law on behalf of the NHS through our Human Rights Act Information Service. Since April 2005 we have been responsible for handling family health services appeals and in August 2005 we acquired the further function of co-ordinating equal pay claims on behalf of the NHS.
GPs have been paid for thousands of patients on their lists who have moved practice, died or been forced to leave the country, according to a report by the Audit Commission.
Checklists that spell out exactly how to care for patients with common conditions have dramatically reduced hospital deaths, say doctors. The British Medical Journal reported a 15% fall in the number of people who had died at one north London hospital trust using so-called care bundles. These are checklists covering dozens of conditions including strokes, heart failure and MRSA infections. The researchers said death rates could be "halved" using the system.