Safety or targets? The government’s choice on routine waiting times
NHS England's priorities point to a patient safety approach on waiting times. But will the government override them in pursuit of targets?
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Why the boring old Mandate just got interesting
"We can't do everything on that budget", cried NHS England. "Well you've got to", replied the Secretary of State.
“I need our long-wait trajectories for a meeting tomorrow!”
A long-waits forecast that was accurate down to the last patient? Yes, and two months running too. We'd be the first to admit there was a lot of luck in it. But you have to be shooting pretty straight to get that lucky...
The cost of restoring 18 week waits
With some guesses about the costs per case, I reckon recovering 18 weeks sustainably might cost £2.1 billion next year and £350 million the year after, if other pressures and enough mainstream capacity are funded. Or £4.2 billion next year and £1 billion the year after, if austerity continues.
Sharp fall in elective admission rate
September's admission rate was sharply down on recent years. However waiting list management recovered, enabling a slight improvement in waiting times to 20.3 weeks. That's still well above 18 weeks though, and the trend remains up.
Introducing monthly cancer control charts
Are your cancer pathways designed to breach the targets? Why not check, using our new monthly cancer control charts? Based on data published by NHS England they analyse whether your cancer pathways are in control, and how often they are expected to breach, so you know what action you need to take.
Introducing monthly A&E control charts
The 4-hour A&E target is the highest profile performance target in the English NHS. We analyse every Trust's performance each month using control charts, and this is an introduction.
NHS relaxes grip on 18 week waits
When financial penalties were lifted from referral-to-treatment waiting times back in March, I said that looser waiting list management might be the first clear sign that focus on this NHS Constitution right was being lost. This has now happened.
The contracting “must do” that you probably aren’t doing
The NHS has no choice about doing it. It is core to any successful contract negotiation. But there are no targets for it, budgets are not based on it, CCGs don't collect data on it, and in practice it is often ignored...
Loading the data into Gooroo Planner
If you're an information professional then you'll probably want to ask: How do you get data into Gooroo Planner? And how difficult is it?