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Introduction
NHS Update
is a brief review of current NHS changes and developments that may impact on
the business and activities of UK Pharmaceutical sales teams. A more
comprehensive monthly review, along with other relevant intelligence and useful
feature articles, is available via our free monthly newsletter:
PharmaceuticalReview.co.uk. You are welcome to subscribe to this free monthly
publication, via the following subscribe box:
Alternatively, if your business
demands a more specific market analysis, you should contact Alan Jones of ajc
healthcare. ajc healthcare corporate newsletters are employed throughout the UK
Pharmaceutical Industry as a source of crucial NHS intelligence.
To discuss how your team could benefit
from regular up-to-date analysis of the NHS changes and issues that directly
impact on your business, please contact:
Alan Jones of ajc healthcare (alan.jones28@virgin.net)
1. NHS Modernisation
The NHS Modernisation Board, set up to oversee the implementation of
the NHS Plan, has published its first annual report and you wouldn't be
surprised to learn that little headway seems to have been made in reaching many
of the targets set out in the Plan. "Modernisation is patchy and there is still
clearly a long way to go", says the report. This is relevant to pharmacos since
knowing which areas are moving faster than others is pertinent to determining
appropriate and timely responses at both national and local levels. Rhetoric v
reality!….. See
www.doh.gov.uk/modernisationboardreport. If that
wasn't enough, further healthcare reform has been flagged by Mr. Milburn. Now
the health service will have to grapple with the concepts of foundation
hospitals, public interest companies, mutuals, 'public service entrepreneurs'
and the thought that management at failing Trusts could be franchised out to
not-for-profit organisations. I wonder if Mr. Milburn has focused on the fact
that the foundation school experiments do not seem to have had a noticeable
effect on the education system and that franchising has done little for the
rail network!……
2. NICE submits
The
House of Commons Health Select Committee has begun a scrutiny of the Institute
and just about everybody who is anybody has been invited in to give 'evidence'.
In their evidence, both the Drug and Therapeutics Bulletin and the British
National Formulary, arguably the UK's two most influential clinical
publications, suggested that the process of appraisal of drugs by NICE was
flawed, that a number of significant decisions had been based on dubious
evidence and particularly criticised NICE's lack of willingness to discuss
their concerns. "The kind of flaws we have found on NICE guidance are far
ranging….sometimes NICE says things that we find difficult to put in the
BNF because they are not quite true."!! Other groups also have all weighed in
with some criticism over something or other - certainly everyone seems to have
been showing off their own particular vested interests! Indeed from the
documents submitted and presentations made so far, it is pretty clear that
nobody seems best pleased with NICE. But just maybe by displeasing everybody,
NICE has got it about just about right?!…. Actually the most interesting
submission so far has to be that by NICE itself. In its' 'memorandum of
evidence' (see
www.nice.org.uk) you can read the most extraordinary
self congratulatory 'essay', as if none of this criticism existed at
all……..
3. Undeliverable NSFs
Prof. Malcolm Johnson, Prof. of Health & Social Policy at Bristol
University, has warned that only 50% of the key targets of the NSF for Older
People are deliverable. Prof. Johnson, who is also Director of the
International Institute on Health & Aging, has said that standards for
mental health, for example, were unachievable. Prof. Alan Maynard has also
pointed out that as the NSFs have not been properly costed, they will "require
determined management if rhetoric is to be translated into practice. They could
be nothing more than a public declaration of intent: an empty policy wheeze".
Alan's comments coincide with the publication of the latest issue of York
University's Health Policy Matters. See
www.york.ac.uk/healthsciences/pubs/hpmindex.htm.
4. Primary Care
The
DoH, in conjunction with the Sowerby Centre for Health Informatics at Newcastle
(SCHIN), has produced an 'on-line' resource for appraising and appraisee GPs.
See
www.appraisals.nhs.uk. SCHIN is also of course the
home of PRODIGY, whose winter 2001/2002 newsletter has just been mailed out. A
new CD Using the Computer in the Consulting Room has also just being issued.
Email
prodigy-enquiries@schin.ncl.ac.uk
for copies of either. SCHIN's health informatics programme for CHD also now has
its own 'portal'. See
www.hipforchd.org.uk
5. Prescribing
In a
Health Service Journal article last month on PCTs and the fact that they will
now be taking on 75% of NHS funding, the author had to have a go at prescribing
costs "Prescribing costs is another concern as PCTs are responsible for
managing GP prescribing. Our national database on spending in this area
calculates that over £130m could be saved in prescribing costs. To
achieve this, the prescribing of premium priced drugs needs to be more
economical….although most PCTs are taking on their own prescribing expert,
there is little experience in the strategic management of prescribing, which is
what PCTs need…." Elsewhere, GPs have accused government on reneging on
its pledge last year to foot the spirally bill for statin prescribing, because
of the CHD NSF, after little extra monies have been provided in prescribing
budgets for 2002/3. So with this and the HSJ comments, expect continued
downward pressure on prescribing costs in 2002. The first centrally- funded
training courses for the extension of nurse prescribing started on 7 January.
Further courses will begin in February and March and continue throughout the
year. See
www.doh.gov.uk/nurseprescribing.
6. Cancer
The NHS
Cancer Plan continues to be implemented. Each of the 34 Cancer Networks is to
be given £10K to spend on tapping into the knowledge and experience of
people with cancer - and to ensure that the results are fed back into service
development. Also a new network of cancer research centres is being set up (see
www.ntrac.org.uk). The January 2002 Newsletter
(Edition 5) from the Cancer Action Team is now available for all the latest
cancer news. See www.doh.gov.uk/cancer to download a pdf copy.
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