UK Health Service

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Horus
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UK Health Service

Post by Horus »

In the UK we often hear about how bad our health service is, but we never hear the good side. Well today I had a really busy schedule, I needed a blood test and I also needed an X-ray on my foot, I attended a local walk in centre gave them my paperwork from my doctor and was told to take a seat. I took a number for the blood test and it was number 28, looking at the counter on the wall they were already up to number 23 so I sat down. My bum had hardly touched the seat when my name was called for the X-ray, I was in and out in about 5 minutes flat, so as I passed the reception I pointed out that I had missed my blood test slot as they were now calling number 33. “No problem” she said and picked up her desk telephone, “just take a seat” within minutes a nurse appeared and called out “number 28 please” I was out of the place and back in my car in less than 15 minutes, how’s that for service? I was back home again within 45 minutes of leaving home. Later in the day I had to attend the eye clinic at 4 p.m., I arrived a tad late for me because of heavy traffic, so I walked through the door at 3.55 p.m. I checked in and within a few minutes despite there being several people in the waiting room my name was called. In the course of 15 minutes I had seen three separate specialists and had retinal image scans, a peripheral vision examination and an eye pressure tests, once again I was out in about 15 minutes and beat the rush hour traffic on my way home. So for me this was a great day and a credit to our over stretched health service, just think how good it would be if we were not treating the rest of the world for free! :stp


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LovelyLadyLux
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Re: UK Health Service

Post by LovelyLadyLux »

I have to say that is all pretty darn good!

On another note - something wrong with your foot? Hope nothing due to accident or injury that would impede your walks.
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Re: UK Health Service

Post by Kiya »

That was quick going, cant complain of our NHS, we are a lot luckier than some to have it :)

Hope nothing nothing serious with your foot or little Annie tripping you over ;) :)
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Re: UK Health Service

Post by Horus »

Thanks for your concerns over my foot, basically I have been getting a lot of pain in the ankle joints and the Achilles tendons in both feet so my doctor advised an x-ray on my right foot which was the worst of the two. I suppose he wants to rule out any fracture injury or joint damage that may have happened before moving on to other possible causes, my own thoughts are that it is arthritis related as I do get some joint pains elsewhere. Unfortunately it has affected my walking this year as at times it gets very severe and I can hardly stand, but at other times the pain goes away and we can get out and about OK, only last week we had a 3 hour stroll around the local lake with no problems. :urm:
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Re: UK Health Service

Post by Grandad »

I agree with you H about only the bad experiences getting headline news. Mrs G and I can both also testify to some excellent service when we have needed our precious NHS.

We both now need regular hospital appointments for various eye problems and the thing that strikes me is the number of staff, not necessarily nursing staff, walking from one place to another for what purpose. I believe there is a lot of wastage both in staffing and procurement in the NHS which really needs sorting out.

But happily we still get good service...
:gg:
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Re: UK Health Service

Post by Horus »

I agree about the wastage, with this modern computerised system that we now have where everything is linked and shared between the hospitals and your doctors, then you do have to wonder about all the admin types that seem to propogate themselves within large organisations. :|
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Re: UK Health Service

Post by LovelyLadyLux »

I'm on about direct medical problems and your foot in that when I was working the coworker who worked directly across from me started having several foot pain. X-ray turned out she had what she termed a 'soft fracture' which was a hairline fracture of a bone. She has no recollection of falling, tripping, dropping something etc on her foot however one of the bones I her foot decided to develop this 'soft' break. She walked around for about 2 months ( :( long time unfortunately) in a walking boot cast but then was all healed up.

Am not wishing the same on your Horus but just wanted to mention that I know of 1 other case where somebody ended up with technically a break of a bone that caused lots of pain in the foot.

Hope it all resolved easily for you AND you did get some Cadillac services via your NHS.
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Re: UK Health Service

Post by Horus »

Thanks LLL, can't see it being a break because it comes and goes, like now it is about OK, but come morning I may be on crutches to get around, then it goes again. :ni:
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Re: UK Health Service

Post by LovelyLadyLux »

Oh then that isn't the hairline fracture then. It was a pretty immediate pain that didn't go away. What I never knew and found interesting is that a bone can break or fracture all on its own AND she wasn't calcium deficient with osteopsorosis. (I know cause I asked)

That is definitely a curious ailment. Course any pains that come and go are curious. Hard to know sometimes what is related to our aging vs something specific that is causing us to hurt. Also amazing how 1 little ailment can impact everything else in our lives.

Today I went for Ashiatsu massage. This is where the therapist essentially walks on your back and the massage is done with her feet and weight. The lady who I go to is super good. There are rails built into her ceiling over her massage bed. You lay face down while she uses her feet at different pressures to pop, snack and crackle (not crack) the bones and muscles and joints. I've suffered with my hip for over a year and went through all sorts of pain and therapies and even had electricity shot through it this time last year. The conventional methods brought little relief but immediately after she ground her heel into my hip (not pleasant) but OMG it was sooo good when she stopped and I immediately started to improve from there. The relief was immediate. Now I'm going more for 6 months maintenance. This form of massage is new (could be ancient but seems to be new here) and definitely effective.
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Re: UK Health Service

Post by Horus »

If it does you some good then go for it :up
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Re: UK Health Service

Post by Grandad »

I don't think we have ever matched the speed of your appointments H but the service we both get is very good.
I mentioned my criticism of the NHS procurement effectiveness, or lack of it. :(
Mrs G has an injection of Lucentis in one eye every 6 weeks for AMD. The cost is £700 per injection. An alternative is Eylea which is used if Lucentis is not effective. Eylea is £900 per injection.
Lucentis is made by Roche who also make a cancer drug called Avastin. In clinical trials Avastin has been found to be as effective as Lucentis in the treatment of AMD. Avastin would cost £90 per injection.
Roche will not allow Avastin to be approved for AMD treatment so the NHS is tied to Lucentis or Eylea at their high costs. With good procurement management I would have expected them to use their purchasing power to get Avastin approved but, of course, Roche have no interest in that so we have a stalemate where NHS is being held to ransom by Roche.
An example where the commercial interests of Roche outweigh the clinical interest of NHS and other clinical bodies around the world for the treatment of this very common desease in older people.
:gg:
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Re: UK Health Service

Post by LovelyLadyLux »

It is a very sad state of affairs re: what you described Grandad. We do tout capitalism and I personally believe Pharmacy Corporations hold it on high as the one and only God to be worshipped. People get lost in the humanity equation.

I don't know how the NHS purchases drugs but I do know that Canadian drugs are purchased in bulk by the gov't which allows them to buy cheap(er) as they they're buying in such large amounts. They also buy predominately generic and I do know that if you need anything other than that which is generic it almost takes an Act of Parliament for you to get what you need. This is particularly important if there are allergies as the Doctors have to prove you can't take the drug.

I also wonder of those injections that Mrs Grandad is getting how much is profit? I know the mark up on medications can be phenomenal.
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Re: UK Health Service

Post by Horus »

It really is a chicken and egg situation, it costs absolutely millions to develop a new drug and unless the companies are guaranteed large rewards then they just won't invest and spend the research money in the first place, just look at the new Ebola cures that come leaping out of the closet once there is money to be made.
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Re: UK Health Service

Post by Grandad »

Yes I understand the huge investments H, there just seems something wrong when the drug companies are in business to find treatments and then hike the price for the duration of their licence until the drug becomes 'generic', 15 years I believe.
In this time many will have been denied the benefits particularly in third world countries. :(
:gg:
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Re: UK Health Service

Post by Horus »

I'm a bit on the fence with this one Grandad, it does seem that the major drug companies make millions from their products, but without such incentives I wonder how many new drugs would reach the market? and the irony is that a lot of new drugs that were invented for one purpose are often found to be extremely useful in other applications that were never invisaged in the first place, so I suppose that in itself is a bonus :ni: The only other way would be for every national government to set up it's own dedicated drugs research organisation funded by the tax payer to produce new medicines that could only then be produced under licence at a nominal cost. If there was also some international co-operation in sharing discoveries between countries then that could also bring generic costs down. Having said that I suppose it is asking for Utopia as no doubt it would (in this country at least) turn into an enormously expensive nationalised industry with massive perks for top managers and inefficiency that finished up costing us all more in the long term. :tk
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Re: UK Health Service

Post by Grandad »

You are probably correct H and we get back to my criticism of inefficiencies within the NHS. Full circle I suppose. :(
But to come back to your original point, we have both had excellent treatment for a whole range of problems, under the NHS so, whatever the cost, we are very thankful for that service. :up
:gg:
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