Two articles on Aberdeen, one for the Guardian’s Society section, one kicking off my Ends of Britain series on Beacon. The Guardian piece focuses on the Aberdeen health village, a newly-opened NHS Grampian centre in the city centre. It’s of interest because it is the first to be funded by the Scottish Futures Trust, Scotland’s antidote to PFI funding. The detail is in the article, but essentially the public sector is involved on both the customer and supplier sides. Continue reading “Aberdeen’s NHS centre for Guardian; its views on referendum for Beacon”
Category: Healthcare
2013: ANPR, Scotland’s IT, NHS whistleblowers, ID cards… and Thatcher
My big journalism project this year was co-editing ‘Ring of steel’ for MATTER, on police use of ANPR, published in August. It is now available to read for free on Medium, where you can also read further commentary by me on the subject. In ‘Ring of steel’, writer James Bridle explored the subject widely, partly through drawing on the wealth of material released by Devon and Cornwall Police in its successful defence of secrecy over the location of its 45 automatic numberplate recognition cameras. The main points had first appeared in the Guardian news article I co-wrote in August 2012, but the MATTER article allowed the evidence to be explored fully. Continue reading “2013: ANPR, Scotland’s IT, NHS whistleblowers, ID cards… and Thatcher”
Duty of candour: a fear of whistleblowing still pervades the NHS
Whistleblowers have been promised changes to support them but many people still worry about speaking out
Last week, Guardian Healthcare Professionals Network focused on how the NHS deals with complaints. Dr Nick Clements of the Medical Protection Society noted that doctors are more likely than ever to receive complaints, and put at least some of the blame on ‘production’ targets for healthcare. Richard Vize, and Dr Suzanne Shale and Murray Anderson-Wallace, wrote about workplace culture, and how that can welcome or repel complaints. Richard Vize concluded:
NHS services which welcome complaints, discuss them with an open mind and embrace them as an opportunity to secure a better experience for patients are likely to be confident, trusting organisations that value their staff and patients. Ultimately it is about distributing power – enabling those who both give and receive care to make the system better. Continue reading “Duty of candour: a fear of whistleblowing still pervades the NHS”
Make Christmas 2013 a highly effective charitable giving season
Earlier this year, I wrote for Guardian Voluntary Sector Network about effective charitable giving, as researched by charity evaluators such as Giving What We Can and GiveWell. They both aim to maximise the impact of donations by finding highly effective charities, usually highly-focused charities working in the developing world on healthcare.
US-based GiveWell revises its recommendations each year in time for the US charitable giving season at the end of December, generated by a combination of Christmas and the end of the tax year: this year, it lists three charities, discussed in detail here. Giving What We Can, a British organisation set up to encourage people to donate 10% of their income to charity, has a similarly short list of recommended charities with just two rated with ‘high confidence’. If you want to donate money effectively, these very short lists are a good place to start. Continue reading “Make Christmas 2013 a highly effective charitable giving season”
Scotland’s Future NHS under independence: much like the existing one?
Scotland’s Future, the 670-page report published last week by the Scottish Government promoting Scottish independence, includes detailed plans on how the BBC, the Royal Mail and the security services would be divided up if Scotland votes in favour of a split next September. Continue reading “Scotland’s Future NHS under independence: much like the existing one?”