01.30.06
Trying to sell the vision
Tony Blair has just been on The Richard and Judy chat show trying to sell the new NHS to the public. In this brave new world people will be able, according to Tony, to see a GP at 3pm on a Saturday afternoon or at 8pm on an evening. Perhaps these consultations will take place in a supermarket or at a train station. Apparently there are 4000 extra GPs in training, and there are already 10,000 extra doctors and nurses already working in the NHS (minus those who have already left since they were recruited). Apparently also hospital consultants are soon to find that life exists outside of the safety of their acute hospitals (no not the local private hospital or golf course).
All of this is fantastic news, I can still get that job in my local supermarket, but perhaps not on the check out, I could perhaps become a practice nurse. Maybe I could job share with a shelf stacker? I wonder what that would do to my agenda for change pay banding?
The problem with all of this is that I am not sure the providers of this healthcare are quite ready for this brave new world. I am not sure 4000 GPs are enough, I am not sure that there are enough nurses who are able to support these services. I am only too happy to tailor care to the patient’s needs, but does that mean every patient? How can we make sure our aging workforce are up for this challenge and how can we meet the wants of every individual who uses the service?
Tomorrow we find out more about our own department’s brave new world. Who will work where, what they will do, where they will do it. The only problem is that in such a changeable environment will things look the same by the end of the week?
