Welcome to the Podcast of Another 15 Minutes, Health News from the Fade Library. Full links to the articles detailed can be found at www (dot) fade the blog 2 (dot) blogspot (dot)com
National News
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Hewitt sparks pay row with GPs - The Guardian 20th January 2007
Patricia Hewitt, the health secretary, risked a head-on clash with the British Medical Association yesterday by suggesting that GPs in England are making too much profit on work for the NHS.
In an interview for the BBC website, she said the government did not realise how much GPs' income would rise as a result of a new contract in 2004 that rewarded practices for providing extra services. As the turnover of practices rose, the doctors took a larger share of the profit. According to official figures, their earnings rose by 30% to £106,000 in 2004/5.
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Hewitt: GP pay rise too high - The Independent 20th January 2007
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Doctors' anger over plan to limit pay - The Times 20th January 2007
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Hewitt: we should have capped GP salaries - The Telegraph 20th January 2007
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Analysis - The Telegraph 20th January 2007
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Now £100,000 GPs face pay cap after ministers' blunder - Daily Mail 19th January 2007
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GP profit cap may be in pipeline - BBC Health News 19th January 2007
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Parents protest at IVF doctor's 'trial by television' - The Guardian 20th January 2007
Hundreds of parents are planning a protest tomorrow in support of the controversial fertility doctor Mohammed Taranissi who was this week accused in a Panorama documentary of offering healthy women IVF and is now the subject of two inquiries by health watchdogs. The Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA) is conducting a longterm investigation into Dr Taranissi's two central London clinics, one of which claims the best success rates for IVF in the country, and has already refused to re-issue him with a licence for the second clinic. Parents who have successfully conceived after treatment at Dr Taranissi's clinic yesterday announced plans for a "party" outside his clinic on Sunday to show their support.
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Health hijack - The Guardian 20th January 2007
Like the sorcerer's apprentice, Tony Blair's 'modernising' reforms of the NHS now threaten to lurch out of control. A brand new hospital in the New Forest, to be paid for by the NHS, is handed over to the management of a private company before it even opens: in Oxfordshire a long-standing NHS orthopaedic hospital, which has just spent millions on rebuilding work, faces the threat of closure or merger as private sector treatment centres hijack the simplest routine cases. Two Essex NHS trusts scrap plans for new hospitals because they face massive losses under the new system of payment by results: west Hertfordshire residents fight the "centralisation" of A&E services on the condemned crumbling site of Watford General, now plans for a £550m super-hospital have been binned. In Bolton 132 medical and nursing staff face the axe as a strategic health suthority opts to divert work to a private treatment centre.
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Looking after Mother - The Guardian 20th January 2007
Filling in a form at the doctor's recently, I found myself answering "Yes" to the question: "Is anyone dependent on you for their care?" It was a sobering moment, a confirmation that somehow I have acquired a new role in life - principal carer for my mother, who has been diagnosed as being in the early stages of dementia. My mother is one of the growing number of vulnerable elderly who the government wants to "support" living independently in their own homes. It's also what she wants. "I'm so lucky," she says on good days. "I've got everything I want." The local social services leap on her upbeat assessment, so the support they provide, which we pay for, often requires more effort to organise than doing it yourself. The reality of "independent" living for me is that I am on call most days, responding to crises, checking she has food, calling in to give her company, collecting her medicine, and organising the so-called support.
New Story
When toys take over - The Guardian 20th January 2007
Liz Hollis's mother still fondly remembers the three toys she had as a child in the 50s. Liz herself also recalls most of her own from the 70s. But her children have so many that now even their toys have toys. Should we be concerned at such an excess?
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All you need to know about strength training - The Guardian 20th January 2007
Anita Bean is a former British Bodybuilding Champion, and author of The Complete Guide To Strength Training. Select your moves There are countless strength-training moves, so which do you choose? Unless you are training for a specific sport, opt for movements that mimic the ones you use in daily life, as their benefits will carry over more. If time is limited, dispense with isolated moves and stick to multi-muscle lifts such as squats, deadlifts and bench presses.
New Story
Sarah Hooper: I've escaped the homeless trap - The Guardian 20th January 2007
I was on the homeless persons list from February 2003 until October 2006. I was living in a private rented property when the owner sold it. I had a new baby and a toddler. On benefit, it is hard to find landlords to take you on. I went to so many estate agents and they all said they didn't take DSS clients. I had to go to the council housing office for help and they put me in bed and breakfast accommodation. We were all in one room - to sleep, cook and eat - and with no cot for the baby. I didn't feel safe there - I could smell the man in the next room burning his drugs most of the night.
New Story
Jail for cheat who claimed disability benefits but took part in marathons - The Guardian 20th January 2007
A man who claimed more than £22,000 in disability benefits and told officials he could only walk using two sticks or a frame was jailed yesterday after it emerged he was a competitive marathon runner. Paul Appleby, 47, told officials that he was largely confined to a wheelchair and needed help eating and going to the toilet. But the court heard that the former miner from Kirkby in Ashfield, Nottinghamshire, was actually a club runner who regularly completed full and half marathons across the country.
New Story
Part of Ashworth special hospital will become jail to ease crisis - The Guardian 20th January 2007
A disused wing of Ashworth special psychiatric hospital on Merseyside is to undergo a £19m conversion in an attempt to cope with a renewed surge in jail numbers. Ministers have been alarmed by the fact that prison numbers have risen by more than 200 in the last week alone to reach 79,375 yesterday, with more than 400 being held every night in emergency accommodation in police cells. Earlier this week some prisoners in London were locked out of full-to-capacity prisons and police cells and had to spend the night in court cells. The provision of emergency accommodation in police cells proved insufficient even though the number of forces involved has been expanded to 35 in the past few months.
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Euthanasia danger - The Guardian 20th January 2007
Peter Singer (Comment, January 17) manages to conflate a patient's reasonable refusal of treatment deemed to be burdensome with a patient's suicidal claim to be assisted (by act or omission) in ending his or her life. Singer claims that in the latter case the patient is merely seeking to escape the illness which "makes life burdensome". But to refuse treatment with the aim of ending one's life is to commit suicide: to make the ending of one's life the means of achieving one's end of being relieved of a particular condition. People in such a depressed state need palliative care and social support. They do not need to be encouraged in taking a false and negative view of the value of their lives.
New Story
Mental health 'helped by birdsong' - The Independent 20th January 2007
Birdsong has a powerful healing effect which can improve mental health and benefit hospital patients, according to a health expert. Dr William Bird, GP, who is a health adviser for the countryside agency, Natural England, said tests had proven the effect. He cites a 2004 report in the prestigious medical journal, Thorax, on the effects of birdsong on patients recovering from a lung operation. "They needed less pain relief and were far more relaxed," he said.
New Story
Cancer study ordered into mobile phones - The Times 20th January 2007
A mass study of the long-term impact of mobile phones is to be undertaken amid fears that people who have used them for more than ten years are at greater risk from brain cancer. More than 200,000 volunteers, including long-term users, are to be monitored for at least five years to plot mobile phone use against any serious diseases they develop, including cancer and Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s diseases.
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Could these be the cigarettes of the 21st century? 'Absolutely' - The Times 20th January 2007
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We need £3m more, says phone scientists - The Telegraph 20th January 2007
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By gum, I'm full up - The Times 20th January 2007
“Hope over obesity-busting gum” was a headline that provided more to chew on than most this week. It arose because a team at Imperial College is developing a drug based on a natural gut hormone that tells the brain you are full up. The idea is to try to incorporate it into a gum that could be chewed before meals.
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Private firms 'to get £23 billion from NHS' - The Telegraph 20th January 2007
The private sector will pocket at least £23 billion of NHS money in profits and interest over 30 years, according to figures published today. The Private Finance Initiative hospital building scheme offers big rewards for the private sector, according to calculations made by the Keep Our NHS Public campaign.
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PFI firms 'make £23bn NHS profit' - BBC Health News 20th January 2007
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Blair said hospital 'would not close' - The Telegraph 20th January 2007
A hospital looks doomed despite a pre-election promise from the Prime Minister that there was "no question" of it being shut down. A review of health services in Teesside has recommended that two hospitals in Hartlepool and Stockton should be replaced with a single "super-hospital".
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Vitamin pill for prostate cancer - BBC Health News 20th January 2007
Scientists have developed a vitamin D pill to treat advanced prostate cancer. Exposure to Vitamin D from sunlight is known to improve the prognosis of certain cancers.
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'Community superbug tests' needed - BBC Health News 19th January 2007
Rapid tests for deadly superbugs that are spreading in the community are urgently needed, an expert is warning. Professor Richard James of the Centre for Healthcare Associated Infections at Nottingham University says Britain is vulnerable to the types of MRSA.
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Folic acid boosts elderly brains - BBC Health News 19th January 2007
Folic acid supplements can improve the memory and brain power of ageing brains, research shows. Men and women aged 50 to 70 who took daily supplements had similar mental abilities to contemporaries almost five years younger, The Lancet study found.
International News
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No way to treat an Aids hero - The Guardian 20th January 2007
If you think the nutritionists and vitamin peddlers in the UK are weird, you really want to go to South Africa, where President Thabo Mbeki has a long history of siding with the HIV denialists, who believe that HIV does not cause Aids (but that treatments for it do), and where his health minister talks up fruit and vegetables as a treatment, as we have previously covered here. In this world, which is not as remote as you might think from where you're sat, Zackie Achmat is a hero: the founder of the Treatment Action Campaign in South Africa, he recently won a breakthrough in his long battle against the vitamin-loving Aids denialists of Mbeki's government, to make HIV medication available through the public health system.
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Health scares - The Guardian 20th January 2007
This Christmas, Tala was given a Barbie microphone set. The present has proved useful, helping her sing along to her favourite pop star, Haifa; her little sister, Maya, received a doll that makes baby noises. No sooner had Christmas finished than Eid arrived. But the mood in Lebanon was hardly joyous this holiday season: the gruelling summer war has offset a fragile political balance, with protesters squatting in downtown Beirut demanding the fall of the current government.
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Trans fats 'raise infertility risk' - The Independent 20th January 2007
Eating more unhealthy trans fats could make it harder for women to get pregnant, according to new US research. Scientists found that for every 2 per cent increase in the amount of calories a woman got from trans fats instead of carbohydrates, her risk of infertility increased by 73 per cent.
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Chips 'can increase the risk of infertility' - The Telegraph 20th January 2007
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Food fats threaten women's fertility - Daily Mail 19th January 2007
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Scientists unravel superbug that kills in 24 hours - Daily Mail 19th January 2007
Scientists have unlocked the secrets of a deadly superbug that attacks healthy young people and can kill within 24 hours. The news is a vital first step in attempts to find a cure for the virulent disease, PVL-MRSA, that is highly resistant to current antibiotic treatments.
Cheshire and Merseyside News
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The Phil Monty - Liverpool Echo 19th January 2007
A MERSEYSIDE man who survived testicular cancer is stripping off to raise awareness of the disease. Phil Morris, from Oxton, will be showing his wares to the world when he poses nude in a national magazine.
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Boy dies following dental operation - Chester Chronicle 19th January 2007
THE Countess of Chester Hospital says a dental operation under-gone by a youngster who later died was carried out by an outside organisation. Jamie Evans, 10, was rushed to Alder Hey's Children's Hospital in Liverpool after dental treatment at the Countess but died last Tuesday.
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Concern mounts over GP service - Midweek Visiter 17th January 2007
MP John Pugh has demanded a full log of complaints about Southport and Formby’s GP out-of-hours call handling service amid fears over patient safety. Mr Pugh met with health chiefs at Sefton PCT on Friday following numerous complaints about Urgent Care 24 (UC24), which took over the service last November.
New Story
Part of Ashworth special hospital will become jail to ease crisis - The Guardian 20th January 2007
A disused wing of Ashworth special psychiatric hospital on Merseyside is to undergo a £19m conversion in an attempt to cope with a renewed surge in jail numbers. Ministers have been alarmed by the fact that prison numbers have risen by more than 200 in the last week alone to reach 79,375 yesterday, with more than 400 being held every night in emergency accommodation in police cells. Earlier this week some prisoners in London were locked out of full-to-capacity prisons and police cells and had to spend the night in court cells. The provision of emergency accommodation in police cells proved insufficient even though the number of forces involved has been expanded to 35 in the past few months.
Cumbria and Lancashire News
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Have your say on NHS proposals - Blackpool Citizen 19th January December 2007
NHS patients and members of the public have the chance to comment on major changes being planned to frontline NHS services at the start of a two-month consultation by regional watchdogs. Health authorities across Lancashire have already started to consult NHS users and the public on Monday over new proposals to reorganise outpatient services.
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Gambling 'epidemic' warning from BMA - Blackpool Citizen 19th January December 2007
Gambling can lead to depression and alcoholism, according to a new report published by the British Medical Association (BMA) this week. It comes a fortnight before Blackpool finds out if it has been selected to have the country's first regional casino.
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‘Help to save lives' is mum's plea - Lancashire Telegraph 19th January 2007
THE mother of a 16-year-old who died from leukaemia has urged East Lancashire residents to pledge their organs to save lives. Christopher Smith developed acute lymphoblastic leukaemia in November and died five weeks later on Christmas Eve.
New Story
Hospitals pay system review call - Lancashire Telegraph 19th January 2007
NEW rules on how hospitals are paid do not do enough to improve quality of care for patients, East Lancashire health bosses have said. They said paying hospitals for the number of operations they carry out was "limited" as it did not measure how well the operation was carried out.
Greater Manchester News
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Mental health staff to strike over job cuts - Manchester Evening News 19th Jnuary 2007
MEDICAL staff have voted to strike over plans which they say will `devastate' Manchester's mental health care and put patients and the public in danger. Community nurses, occupational therapists and administration staff voted overwhelmingly for a walkout over proposals to cut 33 community nurses and eight occupational therapists from the Manchester Mental Health and Social Care trust, while increasing the number of managers and social workers.
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Mental health team are so caring - The Bolton News 19th January 2007
WHILE it seems to be the "in thing" to criticise social care and other services, I am writing to congratulate several agencies in Bolton for all they have done for my mother during the past three years. Since she developed Alzheimer's and required help in her own home initially and then later in residential and nursing care, I have nothing but praise for everyone involved in her care. The advice and help we received, I believe, was second to none. It would be difficult to single out individuals, but I would like to express my appreciation to the social worker who first assessed my mother's needs and the speedy way in which community services were provided. My mother's neighbours were also caring as they "looked out" for her and contacted us when they had concerns.
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Service was there for my baby - Altrincham Messenger 19th January 2007
MY EIGHT-month-old baby became ill a couple of weeks ago, I rang the on call' doctor to be told that he was very busy and due to her high temperature he suggested I attend A&E at Trafford General Hospital. To be honest, I thought they would think I was wasting their time but from entering the department I was treated as a high priority and was totally put at ease as they treated my baby. The staff on this ward were extremely professional. The paediatrician I saw was so friendly, she was brilliant with my baby and explained about her illness and the treatment. Not once was I made to feel like a timewaster, in fact they treated us with a matter of urgency.
Full links to the articles detailed can be found at www(dot) fade the blog 2 (dot)blogspot (dot)com, This has been a Podcast of Another 15 Minutes ... Health News from the Fade Library.
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